Germany is getting tougher on border control and migration as far-right groups make political gains.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government has announced new border controls that include strengthening internal security, cracking down on irregular migration more checks at national borders.

Observers say this undermines one of the pillars of the European Union — freedom of movement over national borders.

The move is the latest in a series of tough migration measures Germany has announced following a series of high-profile attacks allegedly carried out by asylum-seekers.

It also comes after the anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) party scored the first major election win for the far right in the country since World War II.

After a knife attack in Solingen, Germany announced a plan to speed up deportations and cut benefits for certain asylum-seeker groups in the country.

Germany also deported 28 Afghan nationals convicted of crimes to Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.

The latest border measures are intended to “further limit irregular migration and to protect against the acute dangers posed by Islamist terror and serious crime,” the government has said.

But the announced measures, the details of which have yet to be fully detailed, have sparked alarm and confusion among some of Germany’s neighbours, who fear the future of Europe’s economy-boosting border-free zone.

The so-called Schengen Area is a key plank of European Union’s successful economy.

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said that if Germany follows through on tighter controls, it will lead to the “de facto suspension of the Schengen agreement on a large scale”.

“I have no doubt that it is the internal political situation in Germany that is causing these steps to become more stringent,” he said.

Germany has already implemented checks on its borders with Poland, Austria, the Czech Republic and Switzerland and it has turned back around 30,000 people without valid documents at these borders since last October.

The new announcements relate to the expansion of these checks to borders with France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Belgium and Denmark.

While the German government is under pressure from its neighbours not to take actions that would break up the Schengen Area, it is also under rising political pressure domestically to turn back migrants at the border.

Members of the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) have been pushing Chancellor Scholz’s government to turn back asylum-seekers attempting to enter Germany from other EU countries.

The move that would likely create a domino effect across Europe, experts say, with other countries closing their borders to asylum-seekers too.

Another option being considered is implementing fast-track procedures to deport asylum-seekers to other EU countries deemed responsible for processing their claims.

But observers say increased national border controls won’t provide a long-term fix and may only end up inspiring a further backlash when voters see the measures aren’t working.