As Austrian MPs debated the new measures, Matteo Renzi, the Italian prime minister, said that Vienna’s frontier proposal was “shamelessly against European rules”.

Under the new law, Austria will declare an emergency over migrant numbers. Asylum-seekers will then have their claims assessed at the border before being allowed to enter. Almost all will be refused and turned away.

Only those with immediate family already in Austria – or who can prove they are in danger in neighbouring transit countries – will be allowed in.

Otherwise, Austria will assume they are able to claim asylum in whichever neighbouring country they arrived from.

“We cannot shoulder the whole world’s burden,” said Wolfgang Sobotka, the newly appointed interior minister. “So many other EU members are not doing their part.”

The new measures were agreed by the Austrian government earlier this year, after its attempt to impose quotas on asylum-seekers was ruled illegal by its own commission of experts.

But Wednesday’s vote assumed new significance after Norbert Hofer of the far-Right Freedom Party (FPÖ) won the first round of the presidential election.