EU leaders will search for unity at a special summit without the UK on Friday, in the hope of setting a course for a union battered by the Brexit vote and riven by a simmering east-west row over migration. Hungary’s rightwing prime minister, Viktor Orbán, has called a referendum for 2 October on the EU relocation plan, which would see 1,294 asylum seekers sent to the country. EU leaders are also likely to repeat the mantra that Britain must accept freedom of movement in order to gain access to the single market. The EU had “fragmented into rival blocs with sharply diverging views,” he said, listing the southern European countries, the founding six and central European countries. When Slovakia’s prime minister, Robert Fico, stands alongside Tusk to discuss the results of the summit on Friday evening, that view will be put to the test.

Source: The Guardian September 15, 2016 12:56 UTC