EU puts Greece on Notice to curb Immigration

The European Union edged closer on Monday to accepting that its Schengen open-borders area may be suspended for up to two years if it fails in the next few weeks to curb the influx of migrants from the Middle East and Africa.

After chairing a meeting of EU counterparts in Amsterdam, the Dutch migration minister said they expected an unprecedented prolongation of the time governments can impose border checks because the migrant crisis would not be under control before current, short-term dispensations expire in May.

Some ministers made clear such a -- theoretically temporary -- move would cut off Greece, where more than 40,000 people have already arrived by sea from Turkey this year despite a deal with Ankara two months ago to hold back an exodus of Syrian refugees. More than 60 have drowned on the crossing since Jan. 1 alone.

Greek officials noted that closing routes northward, even if physically possible, would not solve the problem. But electoral pressure on governments, including in the EU's leading power Germany, to stem the flow and resist efforts to spread asylum seekers across the bloc are making free travel rules untenable.

"We are running out of time," said EU Migration Commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos as he urged states to implement agreed measures for reducing and controlling movements of migrants across the continent -- or else face the collapse of the 30-year-old Schengen zone, a major EU achievement.

But Dutch minister Klaas Dijkhoff said time has effectively already run out to preserve all of the passport-free regime that has allowed hundreds of thousands of people to trek from Greece and Italy to Germany and Sweden over the past year.

"The 'or else' is already happening," he said. "A year ago, we all warned that if we don't come up with a solution, then Schengen will be under pressure. It already is."

The piecemeal reintroduction of controls by several governments under pressure from domestic opinion at national borders with fellow EU states should be better coordinated, said Dijkhoff, whose government last year floated the idea of a "mini-Schengen" that critics saw as a way for Germany and its northern neighbors to bar the influx from the Mediterranean.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who opened her country's borders to Syrians fleeing civil war last summer, is under mounting pressure to halt the inflow after more than a million migrants entered Germany last year.