VIENNA, May 21, 2024 (BSS/AFP) - British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on a visit to Vienna lauded a joint letter by Austria and 14 other EU countries to find "new ideas" to handle undocumented migrants, including sending some to third countries.

The letter to the European Commission comes ahead of June's European Union elections in which far-right anti-immigration parties are forecast to make gains, and as the bloc juggles how to implement a recently adopted overhaul of its asylum rules.

Conservative Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer said during a joint press statement with Sunak that Austria "fully supports the British path".

Under the controversial scheme set up by non-EU Britain, irregular arrivals will be denied the right to request asylum in the UK and sent instead to Rwanda.

Sunak said he was "delighted" about the 15 countries' push and would seek to keep gaining allies to reduce irregular migration.

"We have to pursue new ideas, new solutions and deterrents, removals to safe third countries like the UK's pioneering Rwanda scheme," Sunak said. 

The 15 countries said in their letter they want the EU to toughen its asylum and migration pact.

They said it should be easier to send asylum seekers to third countries while their requests for protection are assessed.

Austria, Bulgaria, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Estonia, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland and Romania signed the letter, but not EU heavyweights France, Germany and Spain.

Asylum applications in the EU surged to over one million last year, a seven-year high, with Syrians and Afghans the top groups seeking protection, according to the bloc's asylum agency.

While Germany received nearly one-third of asylum bids, it was Cyprus, Austria and Greece that had the highest proportion in relation to their populations.

Austria's anti-immigrant, far-right Freedom Party (FPOe) is leading Nehammer's conservative People's Party (OeVP) in polls.