Estimated read time: Less than a minute
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
BERLIN (AP) — Senior German politicians say they want to keep border controls imposed amid last year's migrant influx in place beyond mid-February, when they're currently due to expire.
With a national election expected in September and German leaders seeking to draw lessons from last week's attack on a Berlin Christmas market, there's little appetite for dropping border checks.
Stephan Mayer, a home affairs spokesman for Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservative Union bloc, told Deutschlandfunk radio Tuesday: "As long as the danger and threat in Germany is as high as at present, we cannot help but keep the internal border controls."
Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere told the Bild am Sonntag newspaper that he intends to keep the border controls "well beyond February." That would require approval from the European Union's executive Commission.
Copyright © The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.