Germany's Merkel wants 'binding' EU quotas for refugees

Refugees accompanied by police officers walk on the railway tracks near Szeged in Hungary on September 8, 2015 after breaking away from a migrant collection point near the Serbian border

BERLIN - German Chancellor Angela Merkel urged the EU to agree to binding quotas on the sharing of refugees, effectively taking a step further than plans unveiled by the European Commission Wednesday.

"We need a binding agreement on the binding distribution of refugees according to fair criteria between member states," she told parliament, adding that "we cannot say we will share out a fixed number of refugees" but should instead agree on a proportional division of the arrivals.