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Hungary is not participating in the European Union’s refugee quota system. Speaking on the TV show Berlin direct on February 21, Martin Schulz, the German president of the European Parliament, explained that Hungary’s PM has “clearly decided to go his own way”.
According to the online news site Hungary Today, Schulz added that other countries in the region – unlike Hungary – might be willing to volunteer in accommodating refugees, citing Portugal and Spain as an example.
As previously reported, the head of the Hungarian prime minister’s administration, János Lázár, has announced plans for another fence – this one on the border with Romania.
Hungary is one of the four Visegrád Group states, along with Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. The V4 group opposes the implementation of the EU mandatory quota scheme to share thousands of refugees within the 28-nation bloc.
In a separate report, the Budapest Business Journal noted that Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán did not sign a measure supporting the quota system at the European Union summit on February 19, the government spokesperson Zoltán Kovács told Hungarian news agency MTI.
The EU leaders adopted the quota scheme proposed last summer on distributing 40,000 migrants from Italy and Greece among other member states.
In a press release, the European Commission said: “In response to the migration crisis facing the EU, the objective must be to rapidly stem the flows, protect our external borders, reduce illegal migration and safeguard the integrity of the Schengen area… All the elements agreed last December should be implemented rapidly, including the decisions on relocation and measures to ensure returns and readmissions”.
The post Hungary has gone its own way on migration appeared first on New Europe.