COPENHAGEN: Denmark’s controversial law allowing police to search asylum seekers and confiscate their valuables to help pay for their accommodation has raised no money in its first 11 days, police said on Tuesday.

The new rules, which allow for cash or items without “sentimental value” — hence no wedding rings — to be seized if they are worth more than 10,000 kroner ($1,498), have brought in “nothing” since coming into force on February 5, a police spokesman told AFP.

Last week 230 people applied for asylum in Denmark, according to the Danish Immigration Service.

“I don’t think it has ever been about raising money,” said Pernille Skipper, a spokeswoman for the left-wing Red Green Alliance party.

Rather, the “symbolic” move was aimed at “scaring refugees into traveling to other European countries than Denmark,” she added.

A spokesman for the anti-immigration Danish People’s Party, Martin Henriksen, said it was “too early to evaluate the law.”

Danish lawmakers adopted the new rules as part of a package of reforms aimed at dissuading migrants from seeking asylum in the country, including delaying family reunifications for some refugees by three years.