Reuters said emergency laws tightening Norway’s asylum rules came into force on Friday as the government tries to stem a sharp rise in the number of people arriving that has led support among voters for an anti-immigration party to surge.

“The debate over refugees has shifted significantly during the autumn, from a discussion marked by sympathy and compassion to one concerned with the problems that refugees and immigrants bring,” political scientist Johannes Bergh of the Institute for Social Research told a local newspaper. 

The Nordic country of 5.2 million people, which is a member of the passport-free Schengen area but not of the European Union.