Achmed is the name of the wiry man with a full beard trimmed to a point and the first white threads in his dark hair.

He is standing in front of Prague's main train station in front of a park bench with a group of Arabic-speaking people.

Young men, also a woman with two small children are there.

Young men also sit on most of the other benches, some of whom talk on the phone in Arabic.

Most come from Syria or Iraq, says Achmed.

They didn't want to stay, they wanted to go to Germany, Belgium or the Netherlands.

Stephen Lowenstein

Political correspondent based in Vienna.

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Michael Martens

Correspondent for Southeast European countries based in Vienna.

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He himself has lived in Germany for a long time, that's how he explains his good German.

Now he is here to help friends.

Help?

Yes, on the onward journey.

Because they couldn't just get on the train and go to Brussels because of the controls.

Achmed does not explain how the journey is to be managed instead.

Memories of the years 2015/16 are awakened.

Of course, one does not see the masses coming on the great trek over the so-called Balkan route, as they did back then.

But migration numbers are reaching record levels across Europe.

About 150 migrants spent the night at the main train station on average, according to the Hlavák Initiative, which provides people in Prague with water, food, hygiene items, blankets and the like.

But actually, authorities and politicians should take care of the matter so that people don't have to sleep outside in the cold season.

The Czech police have arrested 12,000 people who entered the country illegally this year, far more than ever.

Seven years ago, migration routes tended to pass the Czech Republic.

The border control domino game is also reminiscent of that time.

Germany has never abolished them at the crossings from Austria, every six months an application is made to the EU Commission for an “exemption” from the current Schengen Agreement.

Austria does the same with Hungary and Slovenia.

Now the Czech Republic has also reacted to the new route and has started controls at the Slovak crossings.

Austria followed immediately and has also been controlling Slovakia since Thursday.

Interior Minister Gerhard Karner said in Vienna that he didn't want migrants who traveled via Slovakia and were turned away at the Czech border to then turn off to Austria: "We have to be faster than the smugglers."

Hungary praises its border fence

Every car is checked, said an Austrian police spokesman, but above all "typical tractor vehicles" such as vans and mobile homes.

Specially trained officials have "an eye" for suspicious vehicles.

Czech Interior Minister Vit Rakušan said the aim of the controls was "to make it clear to the trafficking gangs that there is an obstacle here".

The Czechs reported the arrest of 120 migrants and seven smugglers on the first day of their checks.

Border controls may be an obstacle, but they are not a big one.

After all, the Austrians have been doing it on their southern border for a long time, and yet around 56,000 asylum applications were made by August this year - around 200 percent more than in 2021, more than at any time since the so-called refugee crisis.

And these are just the migrants known to the authorities.

It can be taken for granted that many people will travel on to their desired destinations north and west undetected.

Only half of those registered remain: in Austria there are only around 32,000 asylum seekers receiving basic care, not counting 58,000 Ukrainian war refugees.

The difference obviously results from the fact that many said “asylum” after being apprehended, but later traveled on.