German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas | Kay Nietfeld/AFP via Getty Images German foreign minister calls for alliance of EU countries to take in migrants Berlin is willing ‘to make a substantial contribution,’ says Heiko Maas.

BERLIN — German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas on Saturday urged European countries to join forces and establish a functioning system to distribute asylum seekers among them, in the absence of an EU-wide solution.

Calling for countries to commit to “a binding distribution mechanism,” Maas told Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland media group: “We have to lead such efforts, along with those other EU member states willing to take in refugees.”

Maas, a Social Democrat, said that Berlin was willing “to make a substantial contribution” to such an alliance, and “to guarantee to always take in a fixed share of people rescued at sea.”

He said that “all other countries remain invited to participate, as well.”

For years, some EU countries have opposed any form of legal mechanisms to distribute asylum seekers arriving at Europe's southern borders among all 28 member countries.

The debate has reemerged in recent weeks after Italian authorities banned a rescue ship from landing at its shores and later arrested its captain, a German national, after she brought shipwrecked migrants to Italy.

In the interview published Saturday, Maas said that disagreement between EU countries about whether or how to distribute refugees “must no longer” impede efforts to stop migrants drowning in the Mediterranean.

His proposal was immediately rejected by Austria’s former and possibly future chancellor, Sebastian Kurz.

Kurz, who is running to regain the chancellorship in September, described quotas as an outdated idea and declared that “the distribution of migrants across Europe has failed,” in a statement Saturday reported by dpa.

Maas’ push comes ahead of a meeting between European justice and interior ministers on Thursday in Helsinki. Maas said he expected ministers “to advance significantly” the discussions on how to deal with people rescued at sea.

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