Austria plans fence at Italian border

A sign reading "Republic of Austria - border control" is seen at Brenner on the Italian-Austrian border

VIENNA (Reuters) – Austria may build a 400-metre border fence at its Brenner crossing with Italy, the police chief for the province of Tyrol said on Wednesday, according to the Tiroler Tageszeitung newspaper.

Whether the fence is built would depend on Italy’s willingness to cooperate, Helmut Tomac told a news conference, the newspaper reported. A spokesman for Tyrol’s police said he could not immediately confirm the report.

Austria has already started building work at the border to enable controls to be implemented if numbers of migrants arriving there make it necessary.

(Reporting by Kirsti Knolle; writing by Francois Murphy; editing by John Stonestreet)