A senior Interior Ministry official says Slovenia is "following the configuration of the terrain" in placing a razor-wire fence along the Croatian border to manage an influx of asylum-seekers. Croatia has lodged a formal protest with Slovenia, saying the new fence entered its territory at several places along the winding boundary. German officials say more than 40 migrants have been blocked from boarding ferries to Sweden because of the Scandinavian country's new border restrictions. Ferry operator Stena Line said that it requires all passengers to carry IDs to conform with the Swedish government's decision to temporarily introduce border checks. Swedish news agency TT said Swedish police were boarding trains crossing the Oresund bridge from Denmark and asking passengers for IDs. Swedish officials say the border checks aren't meant to turn away people who want to seek asylum in Sweden, but to make the asylum process more orderly and prevent people from transiting through Sweden to seek asylum in neighboring Finland and Norway. Slovenian Prime Minister Miro Cerar is quoted by the state STA news agency as telling his Croatian counterpart Zoran Milanovic the barrier is on Slovenian land and has nothing to do with the unresolved border issues left over from the 1990s breakup of the former Yugoslavia. Austria's interior minister says a human trafficking ring suspected of smuggling 1,800 people into Austria since February has been broken up, and 11 of 17 suspects are under arrest. Hungary says it has approved two of the nearly 4,900 asylum requests it has received from refugees since it closed its border with Serbia with a razor-wire fence on Sept. 15. Hungary's right-wing government has stopped all migrant traffic through its territory with more than 200 kilometers (120 miles) of fence on its borders with Serbia and Croatia. Hungary's prime minister says his country and others from Eastern Europe will send over 300 police and border guards to Greece to help "stop" the flow of migrants. Viktor Orban, attending a migration summit in Malta, told Hungarian state television that Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia — the other countries in the so-called Visegrad Group, or V4 — were also taking part in the initiative set up "in the interests of stopping the refugee wave at the southern borders of Greece." Croatia's foreign minister says she is hopeful Slovenia will move its razor-wire fence from a disputed zone on the border between the two neighboring countries. The leaders of Croatia and Slovenia will meet amid border tensions that erupted after Slovenia started building a razor-wire fence inside disputed territory to stem an influx of migrants. Tensions soared Wednesday as Croatia announced a formal protest note to Slovenia saying sections of the fence are on Croatian territory. Swedish police are urging people traveling to and from neighboring countries on Thursday to bring their passports or other identification documents as the country temporarily reintroduces border controls.
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