(Reuters) Germany’s Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt and five European counterparts agreed on a set of goals on Friday to tighten asylum rules in the bloc, including allowing deportations to Afghanistan and Syria.
The meeting at Germany’s highest peak, the Zugspitze, follows Berlin’s decision in May to reject asylum seekers at the border, a policy it said was coordinated with neighbouring countries but drew significant criticism.
It comes almost exactly a decade after former German Chancellor Angela Merkel opened the country’s borders to nearly a million refugees fleeing war and persecution, a landmark decision that reshaped European politics.
Dobrindt met counterparts from France, Poland, Austria, the Czech Republic and Denmark, as well as EU Home Affairs Commissioner Magnus Brunner.
