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Jean-Claude Juncker, the president of the European Commission, will next week propose a big increase in the number of migrants to whom EU countries would be required to give temporary refuge, arguing it should rise from the 40,000 agreed in July to 160,000.
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According to officials briefed on the proposal, to be unveiled on Wednesday when Mr Juncker gives his first state of the union address before the European Parliament in Strasbourg, the migrants to be relocated could be those currently overwhelming authorities in Italy, Greece and Hungary.
Adding Hungary to the list would be a change from the July agreement, and may split the growing unity between central and eastern European countries opposing the new quota system
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The central railway station in Budapest, the Hungarian capital, reopened to hundreds of migrants on Thursday morning after a two-day stand-off. Migrants were allowed to board westbound trains in the belief that they would be able to travel onwards to Germany, but discovered they were being taken to a refugee camp outside the Hungarian capital, triggering clashes between migrants and the police.
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Mr Juncker’s address is expected to kick off a dash to come up with a new solution to the mounting migrant crisis ahead of an emergency meeting of EU justice and home affairs ministers on September 14.
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The Juncker package would include a new permanent relocation scheme to automatically divvy up arriving migrants, officials said. It would also include new rules preventing citizens from EU candidate countries from claiming political asylum — a move aimed at preventing growing numbers of Balkan migrants moving into the EU through Hungary from Bosnia and Kosovo.
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EU leaders previously rejected Commission plans for a compulsory quota scheme and agreed to share out only 32,000 asylum-seekers from Syria, Iraq and Eritrea, short of the 40,000 target Brussels now wants to quadruple.
Officials said it would also include a “trust fund” for north Africa, which will be aimed at helping stabilise many of the countries where the migrants come from.
The Commission has proposed a separate scheme for resettling Syrian refugees processed outside the EU by the UN refugee agency.
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Natasha Bertaud, the European Commission spokeswoman for migration issues, acknowledged that Mr Juncker’s new plan would expand beyond Greece and Italy to include Hungary, but declined to comment on plans to increase the migrant quota before Mr Juncker’s address.
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But Donald Tusk, the European Council president, who may ultimately have to broker a deal between EU countries over how to handle the influx, said “fair distribution of at least 100,000 refugees” was required.
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The Juncker plans come as some recalcitrant states showed signs of softening their opposition to taking in greater numbers of asylum-seekers under a commission scheme. Images of Syrian children found drowned on a Turkish beach after attempting to reach Greece have shocked public opinion across Europe.