Short vs. Merkel: The sudden return of the migratory duel

PSuddenly, viewers see on the screen a young man who at that time hardly anyone in Germany knows him. This is Sebastian Kurz, 30, and Austrian Foreign Minister for almost four years. “I will certainly not interfere in the German debate,” says the politician, who was tuned in to the “heute-journal” tonight in January 2016.

And then immediately interfere. When the German chancellor claimed for the fourth month in a row that Europe’s external borders could not be controlled, the minister of the small neighboring country demanded just that: the closure of the EU’s borders in the Balkans and the introduction of a refugee ceiling.

“It’s also about telling the truth,” he says. Merkel’s refugee policy often ignores the truth, that is. In the years that followed, Kurz became Angela Merkel’s Central European opponent on migration.

For Kurz, the issue is politically central in orchestrating his rise to the undisputed chancellor of his country, but many of the positions for which he was close to right-wing nationalists in 2015 and 2016 will become mainstream Europe in the subsequent years.

The Federal Government and the EU Commission are also embracing the core of the short position on migration policy. In other words, Europe must protect its borders, help those who have the right to asylum, but reject those who do not have that right. And: Anyone who offers illegal immigrants the opportunity to come to Europe creates a suction effect that attracts more people. At one point, Merkel said: “A situation like the one in the summer of 2015 cannot, must not and must not be repeated.”

Then came the fire in the Greek refugee camp Moria. And now 2015 seems to be repeating itself, at least on a political level, and the old duel between Merkel and Kurz over immigration policy is back.

Over the weekend, the Chancellor showed himself in a video message and said in view of the demands to distribute the refugees from Moria directly into the EU without a prior asylum procedure: “If we give in to this pressure now, we run the risk to make the same mistakes that we made in the EU Year 2015 ”. He said briefly “we”, but of course he meant: Angela Merkel.

He countered it on Monday. A surprising number of German media leaked a phrase from the Chancellor of the CDU Presidium meeting. Austria’s role in European refugee policy “is not good,” he said there. You cannot ask for a cheap discount on the EU membership fee and at the same time want to stay out of the refugee distribution. The federal government agreed to accept refugees from Moria.

The Moria images put Merkel and Kurz under similar pressure. Not only from the opposition, but also from her coalition partners. In Germany, the SPD is demanding the admission of thousands of refugees, more than Merkel indicated.

For Kurz, on the other hand, the Moria crisis is the first great test of resistance of his black-green coalition. The Greens have been attacking Kurz for days and are demanding that he reconsider his resounding refusal to accept refugees from Moria. But the head of government has been wearing down the Greens for days. The confrontation took place on Monday night in the Austrian parliament. And then, for the first time, a very special black-green agreement became relevant.

On page 200 is the most unusual passage from the coalition agreement in Austria. Under the title “Crisis resolution modality in the field of migration and asylum” it is stated there that the issue of migration occupies a special place in the governmental alliance: if the ÖVP and the Greens represent different positions here, the discipline the coalition is suspended. Everyone can vote for themselves.

The mechanism was not used directly, but it worked. On Sunday evening, the day before the parliamentary debate, the leader of the Greens parliamentary group, Sigrid Maurer, said on an ORF talk show: “Children who have been living in absolutely unbearable conditions for months, sometimes years, to give them a future perspective, a certain security, Austria could do that without any problems, and that should happen. “

Now the question was: would the ÖVP and the Greens vote differently on Monday? The opposition had scheduled the meeting and introduced several motions: the social democrat SPÖ and the liberal NEOS for the admission of refugees from Moria, the right-wing nationalist FPÖ against. In terms of content, the Greens would now have had to vote with the SPÖ and NEOS, which would have been possible thanks to the approval of the coalition agreement.

But in the end, neither the Greens sided with the two parties with allied content, nor did the ÖVP support the FPÖ. The leader of the green parliamentary group, Maurer, said there had been “unmistakable signs” from the ÖVP that the Kurz party would vote with the FPÖ if the Greens joined the opposition.

Regardless of whether there were these signs or not, Monday in parliament showed that the migration mechanism in the coalition agreement has a disciplinary effect in cases of doubt. Both sides shunned a confrontation because it would have meant an open break on the most sensitive issue of the new coalition. Kurz is signaling that he does not want any political compromise on migration. As in 2015, the Chancellor insists on fixed principles when it comes to migration and does not want exceptions to the rule for humanitarian reasons.

Merkel, for her part, spoke of a “unique emergency situation” in Moria. By Wednesday there should be a compromise in the black-red government on how many refugees will be accepted. There will be a direct meeting between Merkel and Kurz next week: one day after the proposals of the EU Commission on migration policy have been presented, the heads of state and government will meet for the summit.

There are many issues on the agenda, from the Mediterranean conflict to Belarus. When in doubt, the focus on the subject does not depend on the questions related to the content, as they have not changed significantly since 2015. But on how powerful the images of Moria are.