Denmark yesterday allowed refugees to move freely through its territory to Sweden after days of chaos when authorities closed ferry services and a motorway link with Germany to stem an inflow of thousands of asylum seekers.

Denmark, whose government took out adverts in Lebanese newspapers to discourage migrants, emerged as the latest front in Europe’s worst refugee crisis in decades as 3,200 people entered since Sunday, most trying to get to Sweden.

Sweden expects to receive 80,000 refugees this year and has more asylum seekers per capita than any other European nation thanks to a generous immigration policy allowing automatic permanent residency for Syrians.

Allowing the resumption of traffic on ferries and the motorway, Danish police said they had no power to detain refugees. That means that thousands will now travel on to Sweden to seek asylum.

“There are no other possibilities than to let them go free, and consequently we cannot keep them from travelling where they will,” National Police Commissioner Jens Henrik Hojbjerg said. Centre right Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen held talks with political leaders yesterday in a second emergency meeting this week but did not announce concrete action.

“I don’t think anyone, at least not me or the party leaders, as I have heard it, wants Danish police to use force in a very violent way,” he said.

In Stockholm, Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven said EU rules under which refugees should be registered in the country where they first arrive must be upheld and the decision to send refugees on to Sweden was “unfortunate”.

When not temporarily detained, the refugees marched or took trains to Copenhagen, a 35-minute ride from Malmo in Sweden across the Oresund Bridge. Sweden’s Migration Agency said 686 people had applied for asylum in Malmo since Sunday and more that 13,700 had arrived in the country in the past five weeks. Both countries have a generous welfare system but Denmark has recently cut benefits for refugees by up to half in a bid to discourage them from staying.

Volunteers distribute food and drinks to migrants who arrived at Malmo train station in Sweden yesterday. Photo: Reuters

Sweden stands out in the Nordics as the exception. Denmark’s tough refugee policy mirrors similar trends in Finland and Norway where right-wing anti-immigrant parties are on the ascendant and part of coalition governments. The Danish People’s Party (DF), once on the political fringe, became the second largest parliamentary force after June’s election, gaining popularity largely due to its anti-immigration and eurosceptic rhetoric. Rasmussen’s minority government depends on the party’s support in Parliament although his response to the crisis this week has not been anywhere near as strong as the DF would like.

Migrants must see that when they use Denmark in this asylum shopping, we need control

“We are a country based on law and order,” DF leader Kristian Thulesen Dahl told reporters. “Citizens of other countries must also be able to see that when they decide whether to use Denmark as a transit country in this asylum shopping which is going on ... We need control.”

Refugees have been streaming in by two routes from Germany – crossing by train overland into Jutland, the western part of Denmark that is connected to continental Europe, or by ferries carrying trains that arrive in Lolland, an island linked by bridges to Zealand, where Copenhagen is located. At Rodbyhaven, the landing point for the ferries no passport checks were made yesterday when passengers disembarked from ferries.

Akhmed, a 32-year-old from Copenhagen, said that like others he had come to give refugees a lift to Copenhagen.

“I could sit at home and count on other people doing it, but my conscience couldn’t stand for it,” Akhmed said.

The refugees are part of a wave of migrants sweeping north through Europe, many escaping the war in Syria. Austria suspended train services with Hungary for the rest of yesterday because it cannot handle the volume of migrants.