GETTY Italy is buckling under the strain of huge migration

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Police are scrambling to break up pop-up encampments as more and more migrants become stranded in the country unable to travel northwards. As Europe’s free movement zone continues to crumble neighbour Austria, which has taken a hard line on mass migration, has clamped down on movements across the Alps.

And other EU states have abandoned Italy to its fate, reneging on a promise to house thousands of migrants in return for more stringent security checks. With more and more migrants arriving by boat every day there are fears Italy - which has become the main entry point to Europe following the EU’s deal with Turkey - could become the next Greece.

GETTY Coast guards are rescuing thousands of migrants at sea every week

GETTY Police have been stretched to the limit in the country

Piero Fassino, head of the Italian Municipalities Association, warned: "The numbers are crossing the manageable mark.” Italy already has a backlog of 135,000 asylum applications from migrants, most of whom will travel north towards Germany and Sweden as soon as they receive their papers. But with the system dogged by delays and completely overwhelmed, many migrants are becoming impatient at the long wait and taking matters into their own hands. Huge numbers of people have begun making the journey northwards towards the border with Austria, despite the country’s insistence that it will not let them cross over.

GETTY More than 30,000 migrants are waiting in Ventimiglia

GETTY Most migrants in Italy want to travel northwards to settle

The numbers are crossing the manageable mark Piero Fassino, head of the Italian Municipalities Association

Officials in Vienna have unveiled plans to build a huge border fence at the crucial Brenner Pass and have introduced a daily cap on the number of asylum applications they will process. Others are looking to cross illegally into Switzerland and France but those countries, too, have bolstered border controls in a bid to bring migration numbers under control. As a result more than 30,000 migrants have congregated in and around the town of Ventimiglia, on the Italy-France border, hoping for a chance to sneak across the frontier and travel northwards. Italian immigration chief Mario Morcone said: "We are doing everything to avoid a Calais-type scenario in Ventimiglia. We do what we can, and try to do it with dignity."

However, he admitted he was “not optimistic” about the weeks to come, as the flow of people setting out by boat for Italy from the coasts of North Africa continues unabated. More than 3,700 people were picked up in the Mediterranean by Italian coastguard this week, with nearly 40 bodies being recovered at sea. Ventimiglia mayor Enrico Ioculano said his town, where migrants sleep under bridges or on the beach front, is being ”strangled by a system that does not work". And Mr Morcone argued that Italy, like Greece, has changed from a transit country to "a territory they cannot leave”, blasting the EU’s much-vaunted relocation programme as a “clear failure”.

Migrants clash with police across Europe Wed, February 15, 2017 Migrants clash with each other in over crowded camps across Europe. Play slideshow EPA 1 of 107 Moroccan Police look at immigrants trying to jump the six-meter-high fence in Ceuta, Spanish enclave on the north of Africa, 09 December 2016.