European Union leaders meeting in Brussels will try to gloss over their feud about who takes in refugees, a change of tactic that some diplomats have linked to Germany’s election in September.

Eastern states such as Poland and Hungary have refused to take in asylum-seekers to ease the burden on Greece and Italy, where most of the 1.7 million refugees and migrants entering the EU since 2014 have landed by boat after fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and Africa.

Their reluctance to host a share of the arrivals has also angered wealthier countries such as Germany and Sweden, the preferred final destination for many of the migrants.

Despite political pressure, Warsaw, Budapest, Prague and Bratislava have been vehement and the issue has opened deep divisions in the EU at a time it needs unity to face Britain’s exit from the bloc.

“Germany has been pushing for relocation (of asylum-seekers) for a long time. Now they have said we’d better focus on where we can agree and come back to this in October,” a senior EU diplomat said.

“October comes after September,” the person said, stressing the link to the election in which conservative Chancellor Angela Merkel faces off against the social democrat Martin Schulz.

Merkel has come under fire for allowing more than one million refugees to enter Germany over the past two years.

Diplomats said the change of tactics by Germany, which hosts the highest number of refugees, came with a realisation that no political points can be won now on the intractable dispute.

“The change of strategy is justified. We have to make progress in areas like the return of migrants and common standards in the asylum system,” a German EU diplomat said.

“Those achievements will give us the momentum to tackle the more disputed topics.”