Comments given by the Interior Ministers of Austria and Sweden prior to the start of an EU Justice and Home Affairs council meeting  held in Brussels on Thursday clearly indicate that there will be no consensus among the 27 member states on the establishment of an immediate burden sharing mechanism for asylum seekers as demanded by six Southern Mediterranean member states, including Malta, in the wake of the current turmoil, The Times reports.

Calling Italy’s request for burden sharing as “an exaggeration”, Sweden’s Interior Minister Johan Bilstrom said that last year his country received 32,000 asylum seekers.

Minister for Justice and Home Affairs Carm Mifsud Bonnici strongly dismissed the comments by Swedish Minister Tobias Billstrom, the Times reports. He insisted that there were already strong indications that the flow of migrants in the Mediterranean would be higher than in previous years.

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