Trains from Hungary carrying hundreds of refugees started arriving in Vienna and Munich early on Tuesday, witnesses said.
In the latest twist in a humanitarian and political crisis that is now testing the survival of both Europe’s open-border regime and its asylum rules, Hungary allowed the refugees, many of them fleeing Syria’s civil war, to cram into at least four trains leaving Budapest for Austria or Germany.
Austrian authorities appeared to have given up on trying to apply European Union rules by filtering out refugees who had already claimed asylum in Hungary, train passengers said.
Many of the refugees arriving in Vienna’s railway station on Monday evening immediately raced to board trains heading on to Germany, as policemen looked on passively, preferring not to intervene, witnesses said.
Refugees cheered and chanted “Germany, thank you!” as they saw a welcome sign held up by local people at Munich Central Station late on Monday.
Police said some 500 refugees, mainly from the Middle East, were on the train. They were to be transported by bus to camps where they will be registered.
Germany has taken in more asylum seekers than any other European Union country. German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday called for other EU nations to do more to help deal with this year’s influx of refugees.
Austrian authorities have stopped hundreds of refugees and arrested five traffickers as part of a clampdown along a main motorway from Hungary against the criminal gangs exploiting the human misery
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