Spain-Italy border clash threatens Schengen freedom, disrupts Australian travellers

For four decades, the Schengen Agreement has stood as one of Europe's most tangible expressions of unity — the quiet promise that a continent once divided by walls could move as one. That promise is now under strain, as Spain and Italy, locked in a dispute over 72,000 migrants who entered the Spanish enclave of Ceuta in late July, have each reimposed passport checks on the other's travellers for the first time in a generation. What began as a migration management disagreement has become a test of whether European governments still believe in the principle that gave Schengen its meaning.