Austria deploys troops to the Hungarian border, Orbán cabinet talks about possible act of bioterrorism

The foot-and-mouth disease has been identified in four farms in Hungary’s northwestern region after more than 50 years. As a result, authorities are organising the mass slaughter of the affected livestock, and the government has already published its decree concerning compensation. Gergely Gulyás, the prime minister’s chief of staff, said yesterday that he could not rule out that a biological attack happened and an artificially created virus infected the Hungarian livestock. Meanwhile, Austria decided to deploy troops at the border to help defend the country from the virus.

Biological attack cannot be ruled out, says minister

“At this stage, we can say that it cannot be ruled out that the virus was not of natural origin. We may be dealing with an artificially engineered virus”, Gergely Gulyás, the prime minister’s chief of staff, said yesterday at a press conference. He added that their suspicion is based on verbal information they received from a foreign laboratory, and it needs to be confirmed. Therefore, relevant investigations are ongoing.

István Nagy, Hungary’s agriculture minister, also mentioned the possibility of an artificially created virus today. Gábor Kemenesi, a Hungarian virologist, said the chance that we were dealing with an artificial virus is almost zero. Nagy said health authorities found no more infested farms after checking more than 1,000 farms. He said that the extermination of the infected animals was almost finished in Dunakiliti and Darnózseli. Thankfully, that process may end on Saturday. He said the government aimed to help farmers restart production.

Locals started protesting against placing the carcasses near Bábolna, a small Hungarian town in Komárom-Esztergom county. Authorities have already transported 1,700 carcasses there, and another 3,500 will arrive soon. Before, Jánossomorja demonstrated against creating a carcass pit near their settlement. Since the minister is the MP of that district and Fidesz lost Mosonmagyaróvár in an interim election, the government backed down. Now, locals of Bábolna are protesting against the new carcass pit.

Austria deploys troops near the Hungarian border

Austria would not let the virus inside their country, so it introduced strict measures and closed many border crossings on the Hungarian and Slovak borders. Furthermore, Vienna decided to deploy 28 troops at two border crossings, one close to the Hungarian border. The soldiers’ task is to participate in checking tasks, the defence ministry of the country said. The two border crossings concerned are Hohenau (Gänserndorf) and Berg (Bruck an der Leitha), the latter is close to the Hungarian border.

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The office of Susanne Rosenkranz, a local councillor, wrote that all Austrian examinations returned negative results. Spokesperson Stefan Loidl told APA that the police checks introduced last Saturday on the Slovakian-Hungarian border are smooth, Blikk wrote.

No outbreaks were registered in Lower Austria and Burgenland. However, the Austrian government voiced the importance of protecting people and livestock in the Eastern regions. They added that waiting time did not increase significantly at the border crossings.

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