At Saturday’s Munich Migration Meeting, Austrian Interior Minister Gerhard Karner urged fellow ministers to move "from words to returns" as Europe prepares to implement the new EU Asylum and Migration Pact in 2027. Ministers from 17 EU and Schengen states – including Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands and Greece – met in the Bavarian capital on 26 September to discuss practical next steps for faster deportations, strengthened external-border protection and better cooperation with origin countries. Karner emphasised that Austria’s priority is a credible returns policy. Vienna wants EU-funded “Return Centres” in safe third countries to be operational before the pact’s solidarity mechanism launches, so that those who do not obtain protection can be removed quickly. He cited Austria’s own pilot return programme with Georgia and Morocco as a model, claiming it has already cut irregular entries on the Balkan route by 18 percent this summer. The so-called “Group of Implementers” (Austria, Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands and Greece) met on the conference sidelines and agreed to share biometric enrolment equipment and charter-flight capacity for joint removals. They also pressed the European Commission to finalise technical specifications for linking national case-management systems to the upcoming Entry/Exit System (EES) by April 2027. For businesses relocating staff, the message is two-fold: Austria remains committed to a rules-based Schengen area, but it will police its borders firmly until the pact is in force. Companies moving third-country nationals through Vienna should expect continued spot-checks at the Hungarian, Slovenian, Czech and Slovak frontiers and factor possible lead times for humanitarian waiver requests into project plans. Immigration advisers say the meeting’s focus on accelerated asylum procedures should not directly affect highly-skilled work permits, but they warn that tighter carrier-liability fines and more intensive document screening at Vienna International Airport may lengthen arrival queues for non-EU assignees over the next six months.
