Merkel given 2 weeks to solve her migrant crisis

...or we’ll shut the borders say leader’s coalition allies

ANGELA Merkel was yesterday given a two-week ultimatum to reach an EU immigration deal and avoid a rebellion within her own coalition government.

The German leader’s Bavarian sister party, the CSU, had warned it would press ahead with plans to close the borders if no solution was found to cutting immigration.

Now the CSU says it will allow her to try to seek deals with other EU countries instead.

However party leader Horst Seehofer, who is also Germany’s Justice Minister, insisted on a hard-line ‘immigration masterplan’ if she fails.

‘We wish the chancellor success in this,’ he said. ‘But we stand by our position that, if this does not succeed, turning people back immediately at the border must be possible.’

Under Mr Seehofer’s proposals, officials would be handed the power to turn away migrants who have registered for asylum elsewhere in Europe or do not hold valid identity papers.

His plans were rejected by Mrs Mer- kel last week. She fears that unilateral action by Berlin could stir tensions with neighbouring countries.

But speaking in Munich after emergency talks over the weekend, Mr Seehofer said the chancellor now agreed to ‘62-and-a-half’ of the 63 proposals included in his reform package.

In a thinly veiled criticism of Mrs Merkel’s open-door immigration policy, he said his Bavarian party was not behind ‘many decisions that divided Europe’. The CSU has clashed with Mrs Merkel’s Christian Democrats over the policy, saying it adversely affected Bavaria.

Mrs Merkel insisted that there would be ‘no automatism’ regarding rejections at the border even if she did not find a deal with other EU leaders before a summit this month.

‘Turning away migrants at our borders at the heart of Europe will lead to negative domino effects that could hurt Germany, and put into question European unity,’ she added.

Dampening CSU claims that it could eventually push ahead with its proposals regardless, Mrs Merkel insisted she was ultimately in charge of government policies. She did however promise that those asylum seekers who have already been rejected would not be allowed to re-enter Germany.

She is due to discuss the matter with French president Emmanuel Macron today.

Last week’s decision by Italy’s new government to reject a rescue boat that had picked up migrants from the Mediterranean sparked fresh discussions Europe-wide on how to handle the crisis. Hungary and Poland have insisted that countries should be responsible for their own response, rejecting Mrs Merkel’s hopes for a Europewide solution.

While the number of arrivals in Germany has fallen, hardliners fear that a further surge could deepen divisions exposed by the 2015 immigration crisis. Critics have blamed the chancellor’s border strategy for fuelling the recent surge in popularity of the far right, which entered parliament last year and is now the opposition.

‘Negative domino effects’