Germany has reinstated border checks at all land crossings on its nine borders to curb migration and tackle crime, according to officials.
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00:00Rows of German border police cars and vans have been gathering at the border crossing
00:04from Belgium into Germany to carry out passport checks.
00:08The same deployment will be seen at the other eight land borders.
00:12This move came after Germany put a hold on Schengen, which defines the borderless EU
00:17zone among member states.
00:20The goal is to curb migration and protect against the acute dangers posed by Islamist
00:24terrorism and serious crime, said the country's Interior Minister Nancy Faeser last week.
00:29In principle, our measures are designed so that we act in a timely, roomly and flexible
00:35manner, adapting to the situation.
00:36This means that there will not be the same intensity of checks at all times, and in addition
00:42to the checks that we observe at the border line, what we see here in the background,
00:47there are also measures that take place in a border area with a depth of 30 kilometres.
00:51And so it is not to be expected that we are at the same intensity every day at the same
00:57time, but the border checks will be carried out consistently throughout the entire border
01:03area from today onwards.
01:07Controls are planned for six months, but may extend further.
01:11Officials and diplomats in Brussels have expressed dismay, calling the move to be obviously aimed
01:16at a domestic audience.
01:18The new control points are not causing any traffic jams for now, but travellers can still
01:22help speeding up the process by having their travel documents ready before crossing the
01:27German border, as they could face spot checks.