Serbia Ready to Follow Suit if Others on Balkan Migrant Route Close Borders

Migrants from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan rest on the ground while waiting to be registered in the registration camp in the south Serbian city of Presevo, Serbia, 01 February 2016.

If some countries on the so-called Balkan route close their borders to asylum seekers, Serbia will have to do the same on its border with Macedonia, Serbia’s Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic has said.

"Those people will not be able to be stationed here," Serbian broadcaster b92 quoted Dacic as saying after a meeting with his Austrian counterpart Sebastian Kurz in Belgrade on Tuesday.

Kurz said that Austria had decided to cap at 37,500 the number of asylum seekers it would take in this year and the quota was slowly filling up. 

The objective is to stop migrants at the Greek-Macedonian border and it is important to include Serbia in this effort, Kurz said, adding that Austria will send soldiers and police to that border.

The so-called Balkan migrant route to Austria and Germany runs from Greece through Macedonia, Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia.

More than 700,000 people passed along the Balkan route on their way to Western Europe last year, according to Serbian government estimates.

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