Orbán: Hungary will not carry out EU decisions on migration

Hungary will not carry out the EU's decisions on migration, the mandatory quota and the obligation to build migrant camps will not be accepted, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said at the Hungarian-Austrian-Serbian migration summit in Vienna on Friday.

According to Orbán, Hungary will find legal and political ways to avoid implementing Brussels' decisions.

"Not only must Hungary defend itself against illegal migrants and people smugglers, but also against Brussels, and it will do so,"

he said, adding that without Serbia and Hungary there would be hundreds of thousands more illegal migrants in Austria, Germany and the Netherlands than there are now.

MTI reported that Orbán said that the Hungarian model is based on a simple concept: no one is allowed to enter the country until their asylum application has been processed. "Entry is possible only if the application submitted has received a favourable response," he said. The prime minister said that this model works and should be adopted by all countries in Europe. "However, that is not what is happening, because the regulation adopted in Brussels imposes mandatory quotas and obliges member states to create refugee camps and migrant ghettos," Orbán said.

The EU asylum reform

After years of debate, EU member states agreed on two key proposals on the issues of asylum and migration in June this year. The Council of the European Union consisting of member state ministers reached an agreement on asylum and migration management and on the regulation of asylum procedures.

Under these, member states would resettle 30,000 people a year from the countries most affected by migration to other member states. Countries that do not want to take on any migrants could opt out by paying money or sending staff to assist with asylum management, for example.