Migrant crisis: French PM Manuel Valls warns EU over influx

The French Prime Minister, Manuel Valls, has warned that European society could be totally destabilised if the EU lets in every refugee who arrives.

In a BBC interview, he said the migration crisis was putting the entire EU project at risk, not only the EU's passport-free Schengen zone.

He said the EU must urgently expand reception centres for migrants in Greece and other countries on the EU's external borders.

Failure to do so could lead EU states to reimpose more border controls inside Schengen, he warned. That would seriously undermine freedom of movement, one of the EU's greatest achievements, he said.

Most of the estimated 1.1 million migrants who reached the EU last year - a record influx - fled the fighting in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Mr Valls described the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, as "courageous" for her open door policy on migrants, but stressed that Europe as a whole could not welcome all refugees.