Hungary is new hot spot on migrant route into EU - Part 2

Hungary's Orbán urges EU migration debate, sees threat to democracy
REUTERS,   BUDAPEST Thu Oct 22, 2015

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán urged European leaders late on Wednesday to change their immigration policies and involve voters in a debate about the continent's future, saying they would otherwise face a political crisis and a threat to the democratic order.

Hungary has responded to the largest migration wave Europe has seen since World War Two by building a steel fence along its borders with Serbia and Croatia, a step both welcomed and criticized by various leaders around Europe.

The fence has sealed Hungary's borders but caused a growing backlog in Balkan countries which are struggling to usher them on to Germany through Slovenia, which has already asked for the European Union's help.

Hungary's ruling center-right Fidesz party has taken a hard line against the tide of immigrants fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and Asia, most of them refugees from Syria's civil war. It has spoken of a threat to Europe's Christian and democratic way of life and demanded action from the EU, which is deeply divided on the issue.

Orbán, who was due to address the European People's Party congress in Madrid on Thursday, told the state television channel m1 that European leaders had no mandate to let hundreds of thousands of migrants enter the EU with little or no control.

"This destabilizes European democracies," he said. "We need to start the debate about the future of our continent honestly, without the muzzle of 'political correctness', without pretence, talking straight."

"We need to listen to the people and incorporate their views in our politics. If we can't do that, we'll have a political crisis on top of our migrant crisis."

He said Hungary's border fence had been meant to turn migrants back from Europe, not divert them along a different path to Germany, and that he had asked Hungary's Balkan neighbors to help send the migrants back.

"The right thing to do is not to ensure their passage into Europe but to take them back to the refugee camps they started out from," he said.

"The further they come from their troubled countries, the more difficult it will be for them to return. Therefore these people must remain (in their region) and humane conditions must be created for them (there)."

(Reporting by Marton Dunai; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

October 21st, 2015
Orbán to attend extraordinary summit on migration on Sunday
By Hungary Matters

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán will be attending an extraordinary summit on migration at the invitation of European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker this Sunday, head of Orbán’s press office Bertalan Havasi said. Juncker has invited the leaders of countries affected by migration in the western Balkans. The EC said that the meeting aims to bring about an agreement on “operative conclusions” that can be immediately put in practice. In addition to Orbán, the prime ministers Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany, Greece, Macedonia, Romania, Serbia and Slovenia have been invited.

October 22nd, 2015
Gyurcsány: Europe not threatened by “Islamisation”
By Hungary Matters

Former prime minister and Democratic Coalition party leader Ferenc Gyurcsány said “Islamisation” was not a threat to Europe, as the proportion of Muslims would not exceed 10% of the population, even according to “radical estimates”. The basic question behind the crisis is whether Europe can retain its character or whether it should feel threatened by Islamisation, he said. “The question is: can we stay as we are with our culture, values, customs and faith, as Christians if you like, or are we threatened by another culture,” Gyurcsány said, addressing a forum in Kecskemét, central Hungary. He said currently some 10-12 million Muslims live in 500-million-strong Europe.

“Even the most radical estimates suggest Muslims would not exceed 10% of the population of Europe by 2060.” Europe is not being “Islamified” but Muslims are being “Europeanised”, Gyurcsány said, citing data showing that only 20% of third-generation Muslims go to church and these people have fewer children, too. He insisted that third generation Muslims and Europeans were not that different. Gyurcsány said the migrant quotas “should not to be ruled out”. As an xample, he said in a city the size of Kecskemét [population 110,000] two Muslim families would be received. He noted that over the course of history, Hungary had accepted Cumans, Schwabs, Šokci people and Serbians and these were successful. He said Prime Minister Viktor Orbán may gain in the short term from the migrant crisis “by posing as the heroic protector of the nation”.

The All Hungary Media Group


October 22nd, 2015
Orbán: EU migrant policies need mandate
By Hungary Matters

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European leaders have not been a mandate by the European people for their migrant policies, the prime minister said ahead of the European People’s Party Congress in Madrid. “Nobody has ever voted for Europe to receive migrants by the hundreds of thousands,” Viktor Orbán said, adding that the gap between Europeans and their leaders’ policies and opinions could destabilise European democracies.

Orbán called instead for “honest and open debate free of political correctness” on the future of Europe. On the subject of Sunday’s EU summit called together by Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the European Commission, Orbán said Slovenia had asked for a summit to be convened because it is unable to cope with the crisis alone. “It was difficult for Hungary when it was on its own, too. But now the Visegrád countries [the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia] are behind us, and this provides Hungary with a strong political hinterland.” Central European cooperation could help Slovenia, too, he added. Addressing the issue of the recently-completed fence on Hungary’s border with Croatia, Orbán said Hungary’s position was clear: to put a check on the uncontrolled flow of migrants into Europe, in order to protect the continent.

bb1 wrote:
Former prime minister and Democratic Coalition party leader Ferenc Gyurcsány said “Islamisation” was not a threat to Europe, as the proportion of Muslims would not exceed 10% of the population,

Really? And how many children do muslim women have, as opposed to how many European women have? If he can't even work that out, see the Hell on earth he is creating for future generations, then he deserves to be 'martyred' by one of his pet migrants.