migration

Hungary partners with America First Policy Institute to uncover causes of illegal migration

Illegal mass migration is being organised by the same players in Europe and the United States using the same set of tools, Miklós Szánthó, head of the Center for Fundamental Rights, said in Washington, DC on Wednesday after reaching an agreement with the America First Policy Institute.

The Hungarian think-tank and AFPI have agreed to draw up a package of political proposals aimed at uncovering the causes of illegal migration, identifying those promoting it and presenting the political, ideological and cultural background of the means they use.

The challenges posed by illegal migration serve as common ground, just as it has brought Hungarian and American conservatives together in thinking that the nation should come first, Szánthó told the “No Borders, No Nation” roundtable discussion held at the Hungarian embassy.

Szánthó outlined the ongoing legal debates on migration in Europe, emphasising that immigration laws are national competencies under European Union law. He said physical barriers on the border and “legal barriers” in the form of laws were both important elements of border protection.

AFPI executive director and former acting US secretary of homeland security Chad Wolf said that immigrants to the US were no longer coming from just Latin America, but migrants from 150 countries were now showing up at the Mexican border. The authorities register some 170,000-200,000 illegal entrants a month, but estimates say that another 70,000-80,000 people cross the border without any kind of registration, he said.

September 15, 2023

Italian PM: demography the issue that defines a nation’s future

Demography is not simply one of the main issues, it is an issue on which the future of a nation depends, Giorgia Meloni, the Italian prime minister, said in her address to the 5th Demographic Summit in Budapest on Thursday.

She said it was a top priority of her government to bring about a fundamental cultural change as regards the approach towards family affairs in Italy which, just as the rest of the western world, is hit by a serious demographic crisis.

The number of births fell, and a strong anti-family atmosphere has developed; the image of the family gradually faded in the media and has been taken over by individuals as consumers.

“We live in an era when the most important elements of our identity are under attack, and yet without this identity we are just numbers, tools in the hands of others”, she said.

Fewer and fewer children are being born in Europe, so resources must be mobilised to support families, as Hungary perfectly exemplifies, the Italian prime minister said.

Thanks to the government’s efforts, Hungary has managed to reverse the deteriorating fertility rate, the number of marriages and the number of the employed has increased, and, very importantly, the number of the employed among women increased, Giorgia Meloni said.

She said the Hungarian example shows that with a family-friendly policy, women do not have to choose between work and family. Real freedom is when women can choose to have children alongside work, and Hungary is a good example for this, Meloni said

Many people believe that migration can help ensure prosperity, she said, adding that she did not accept this view. Nations must assume responsibility for their own future, she argued.

Meloni said she had been shocked by the recent controversies related to the 1956 uprising against the Soviets. “1956 was not only an uprising against a foreign power, but also an uprising against those who wanted to destroy the foundations of Hungarian identity: family, national identity, and religion,” she said.

There are pages of history that cannot be rewritten, she said. “We see the same thing in Ukraine today, and this cannot be accepted,” Meloni said. .

Bulgarian president Rumen Radev said the rivalry between societies in the digital 21st century will no longer be about territory, but about human capital, as this is the most important value. He noted that over the past ten years his country lost 12 percent of its population, largely due to emigration. Expanding the family support system will help support this, but the most important thing is to strengthen the rule of law and fight corruption, he said.

Tanzania’s Vice president Philip Isdor Mpango said the population in his country is growing by 3.2 pmercent a year and the fertility rate is currently 4.8 percent, but at the same time, one in three children die before they reach the age of five.

Mpango said Tanzania is not one of the big sources of migration, in fact, it took in more than 400,000 refugees from neighbouring countries.

We believe in the idea that problems must be tackled at their roots: African unemployment and emigration can be remedied by providing economic assistance and improving the efficiency of governance, said Mpango, calling for international cooperation to help Africa deal with its demographic problems.

September 14, 2023

PM Viktor Orbán says the liberal elite must be pushed aside

Hungary is the most steadfast and vocal proponent of the cause of families and demographics in European politics, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán told the 5th Budapest Demographic Summit on Thursday.

Orbán said the Hungarian government was preparing to draft the country’s “family policy 2.0”, and called on participants to “turn European family policy around together.”

Liberals’ attacks against Hungary for its pro-family, conservative and patriotic policies are in vain, “that only make us tougher – there will be no change,” Orbán said.

Orbán welcomed attendees, saying that the large number of visitors showed “the matter of families and children moves people everywhere in the world.”

Since the last summit two years ago, “the world has changed, and we now live in the shadow of war,” he said.

At the same time, he welcomed that right-wing parties and Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni won the elections in Italy. “We thought Italy would never have a patriotic, family-loving, Christian government again.”

Orbán agreed with Meloni that Europe’s future was in families, and that “it is important for children to have a father and a mother.”

He said Italy and Hungary were both the “homeland of freedom fighters”. “Freedom without authority descends into chaos, and authority without freedom becomes authoritarianism,” he added.

Orbán also greeted the Chairman of the Azeri parliament, the Serbian president of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Bulgarian president.

Bulgarian President Rumen Radev is the “guarantee for stability in Bulgaria”, an important ally of Hungary in the fight against illegal migration and in protecting energy security, he said.

Orbán said Europe was led by a progressive liberal elite “busy with all kinds of nonsense” instead of important European issues, such as the future of the continent’s demography.

He cited a survey of the Matthias Corvinus Collegium, which said that European surveys were biased towards “the fears of the progressive political elite” and did nothing to probe the real concerns of Europeans.

“This is the most worrying development in the West in the past 70 years,” he said. Leaders may have “no idea of the real problems of real life” in a dictatorship, but that is unimmaginable in a western democracy, he added.

European citizens want to be able to start families in safe homes, to raise their children in peace and security. These are “demographic issues, which continue to be far down on the agenda in European politics.”

Orbán said the root of that phenomenon was that liberals had “hacked” the political life in the West.

Western political life, “the discourse, the outlook, the way of thinking, the interpretation framework of how the world works,” has been hacked by the liberals in two steps, he said. The first step was spreading the view that the individual was the most important thing in the world. “They see dictators in everyone who sets boundaries to their individual wishes,” he said.

Those boundaries, however, are also railguides, he said. The boundaries of family life “are essential for freedom; freedom requires at least two people, one person alone is not free but lonely.”

Liberals also tried to “hack” European life by “spreading strategic fears of the future”, the prime minister said. “Liberals strive to keep irrational fears from the future on the agenda, and to magnify them,” he said.

“Liberals expect people to live submitting all their actions to an impending apocalypse,” he said.

September 14, 2023

The EU may enlarge, what impact will this have on Hungary?

The most important part of European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s State of the European Union address was when she spoke about EU enlargement and European integration, Hungary’s regional development minister said late on Wednesday.

Von der Leyen’s assertion that the bloc could expand to more than 30 members in the future is “the clearest statement made in the recent period”, Tibor Navracsics said at a discussion on the future of the EU organised by the European Parliament Liaison Office for Hungary.

The minister, a former European commissioner, welcomed that the EC president had made it clear that enlargement was a “false dilemma”, saying this “gives a very good perspective for integration, as integration is a real success story when it comes to peacemaking”.

Former foreign minister Péter Balázs agreed that counting the Western Balkan states and the members of the EU’s Eastern Partnership programme, the bloc could admit up to nine new members by as soon as 2030.

Concerning green transition, Balázs said that the process at times hurt the competitiveness of industry, and the room for manoeuvre in the transition had been restricted by the Russia-Ukraine war and the sudden need in some cases to cut off “uncertain Russian energy sources”.

Navracsics said that in terms of the EU’s competition with the United States and China, a key question was whether the 27-member bloc would become a “protectionist market” or if unity would be fractured along national interests.

Meanwhile, he welcomed von der Leyen’s mention of demographic factors and work and family life balance when it comes to labour market challenges.

As regards the upgrade of Hungary’s energy network, Navracsics said it was “regrettable” that the EU was not prepared to provide the resources needed for this even though a switch to renewable energy would require an investment of up to thousands of billions of forints.

On the topic of migration, Navracsics and Balázs agreed that because of the varying ideas and national interests among member states, it was unlikely that an agreement would be reached under the current EC.

September 14, 2023

Jobbik afraid of migrant ghettos in Hungary

The government plans to set up “migrant ghettos” in Hungary, according to an opposition Jobbik-Conservatives official, who called for the prevention of “migrant imports”.

Instead of tapping Hungarians, the government has decided to draught in half a million migrant workers, László Lukács, the party’s parliamentary group leader, told a press conference in front of City Hall in Debrecen, in eastern Hungary. He insisted that the “migrant ghetto” planned for the city would house Asian migrant workers, who would take away the jobs of “the people of Debrecen” and depress local wages. Their presence would also compromise the culture and civic life of the city, he added.

To draw attention to this, he said Jobbik was placing a sign next to the construction of China’s Catl battery plant, pointing out that “thousands of migrant workers will come to this city and take away the work of Hungarians”. Lukács added that the plant would “leach Chinese chemicals into Hungarian soil”. Referring to the prime minister, he said the “Orban plan” for “the resettlement of migrant workers must be stopped”.

Read also:

Former Jobbik party leader Vona to start new party

September 12, 2023

PM Orbán wants to remain in power for much longer than he previously said

In 2018, the Hungarian prime minister, winning his fourth consecutive supermajority in the general elections in 2022, planned to remain in power until 2030. Now, he said he would like to lead Hungary for much longer.

PM Viktor Orbán is a unique phenomenon in the Hungarians and world politics. Despite Hungary’s size and population he is one of the most well-known and quoted politicians. Even American senators mention his name or policies in committee hearings. The world press writes about him as many times as they did about the 1956 Hungarian revolution and freedom fight. Of course, in some circles, Orbán’s publicity does not follow the support towards him.

That is why world leaders follow Orbán’s statements about his willingness to remain in power. Though there were initiatives to limit the number of terms a Hungarian prime minister could serve, nothing was enacted. Thus, a prime minister may remain in power for decades, provided he receives enough popular support. In that respect, Orbán and his Fidesz party have been the most successful since the start of the parliamentary era in Hungary.

Read also:

PM Viktor Orbán on holiday with opposition politician in Croatia — check out the details and a video HERE
Cult of personality? Orbán’s ‘orders’ on the wall of a Hungarian school

Islamisation and Christian migrants

In 2018, PM Orbán said he would like to govern until 2030. On Saturday, however, he said in his annual keynote speech in Kötcse that he would like to extend that period until 2034. He explained that the COVID epidemic and the war took away four years. He said Fidesz is less popular because of the economic crisis, but their background is strong because of ideological and political reasons and the opposition’s weakness. Here is a video of the “Kötcse summit”:

And some photos with the caption “Reunited”

Orbán said that the Islamisation of Europe is a great concern. That is why Christian communities would flee to Hungary from the West, telex.hu wrote.

Die Presse: Hungary in serious crisis

Die Presse, a leading Austrian daily, said that Fidesz and Orbán were able to create a parallel universe for the people of Hungary. That is the reason why his power does not vanish despite Hungary’s sky-high inflation rate. Regardless of what the government says, however, the Hungarian economy is in a considerable crisis, consumption falls, and the state budget’s deficit will soon reach 5.5-6%, 24.hu wrote. However, Orbán may remain in power because of the parallel universe he created in which Brussels and the EU sanctions are responsible for all economic hardships. The question is whether people will believe him or not.

Orbán receives Azerbaijan economy minister

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán on Monday received Mikayil Jabbarov, Azerbaijan’s economy minister, in his office, with talks centred on energy cooperation, the PM’s press chief said in a statement. Hungary’s energy security has been enhanced thanks to Azeri natural gas storage in Hungary which began in July, Orbán said at the meeting attended by Péter Szijjártó, the minister of foreign affairs and trade, and Marton Nagy, the minister of economic development.

Several Hungarian companies are expanding in Azerbaijan, and more Hungarian investments there are also on the horizon, the statement noted. Regarding the reconstruction of Karabakh, Azerbaijan has designated the settlement entrusted to Hungarian companies for reconstruction, it said. Orbán also noted the 200 scholarships Hungary offers to Azerbaijani students pursing their studies in Hungary.

September 11, 2023

Sudanese woman received long prison sentence in Hungary: she concealed her identity

A Budapest court sentenced a Sudanese woman to nine years in prison on charges of child pornography and illegal ownership of drugs, the Municipal Chief Prosecutor’s Office said on Monday.

According to the authority, pornographic images of children had been stored on the defendant’s mobile phone, and a “significant amount” of drugs were seized from her apartment in Budapest.

The defendant had stayed in Hungary as a refugee since 2003, until the authorities initiated stripping her of her refugee status because she was believed to have been using a false identity. In January 2021, the inspectors “seized the woman’s telephone and found 3 images of child pornography”. They added that the defendant had “shared two such images with other users” in September 2019.

In the woman’s rented home in Budapest’s eighth district the inspectors found 400 grams of cocaine. On top of her prison term, the defendant has also been banned from Hungary for 9 years, as well as from any occupation involving minors. The sentence is appealable.

Read also:

Minister: Hungarians in danger in civil war-torn Sudan

September 11, 2023

Hungary wants to counter migration with this African country

Cooperation between Hungary and Algeria is key, as the two countries hold similar positions on illegal migration and the war in Ukraine, Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said after meeting his Algerian counterpart on Friday.

Hungary, Algeria on the same page concerning migration

Hungary and Algeria are both freedom-loving countries that reject attempts at outside interference, the foreign ministry cited Szijjártó as saying at a joint press conference with Ahmed Attaf in Budapest. The two countries also see eye to eye when it comes to their serious security challenges, Szijjártó said. The European Union is facing some of its most severe economic and security challenges of all time, with the latter being related to the rising threat of terrorism in Africa, he said.

Former French colonies in Africa have seen eight coups in three years, which destabilise the region and result in a rise in migration pressure on the European continent, the minister said. Hungary faces security threats from two different directions, namely the war in Ukraine from the east and illegal migration from the south, Szijjártó said. “That’s why cooperation between Hungary and Algeria is important to us, because we are on the same side and hold similar positions when it comes to both issues,” he said.

Migration flows towards Europe need to be stopped as quickly as possible, new armed conflicts in Africa must be prevented and the countries in the region must be given the help they need to preserve their stability and develop their economies, the minister said. In other words, it is the root causes of migration that need to be addressed, Szijjártó said, adding that instead of encouraging people to come to Europe and “supporting the business model of people smuggling rings”, Africa should be helped in achieving stability and peace and eliminating the causes of migration.

Read also:

Hungarian police after head of people-smuggling ring – Read more HERE
A little boy died in a horrific accident in Hungary

Hungary supports Algerian in the UN

“This is especially true for the Sahel region . if stability can’t be restored here, then Europe will face more migration waves, and in the current situation the continent won’t be able to manage two simultaneous security challenges,” Szijjártó warned. Turning to the situation in Ukraine, the minister said both Algeria and Hungary were part of the “global pro-peace majority”, stressing that only a diplomatic settlement could save lives.

“And the conditions for achieving peace are better today than they will be tomorrow,” Szijjártó said. He also expressed concern over reports of potential deliveries of weapons to Ukraine that pose danger and health hazards, calling on the international community to refrain from steps that would lead to an increase in the number of such weapons in the region. “We welcome that Algeria is also committed to dialogue and trust that as a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, it will be able to contribute significantly to a peaceful settlement to the war through diplomacy over the next two years,” Szijjártó said.

More Algerian students will come to the Hungarian universities

Meanwhile, he said 100 Algerian university students are awarded scholarships to study in Hungary each year, adding that the roughly 900 applications submitted this year reflected the strong interest in the scheme. In response to a question, Szijjártó said the precondition for Hungary importing natural gas from Algeria would be the construction of an interconnector with Slovenia, on which an agreement has recently been finalised and could be signed next month.

Once the interconnector is built, Hungary will be able to negotiate on the further conditions such as price, he said. The sides have therefore agreed that Hungarian and Algerian companies will begin exchanging information to determine whether there is a possibility for them to establish trade relations, he added. On another subject, Szijjártó said it was “indisputable” that there had been “American meddling” in last year’s general election in Hungary. The aim, he said, had been to secure a victory for the opposition and bring Hungary “to the pro-war side” and get it to participate in weapons deliveries.

The voters, however, made it clear that investment in the Hungarian elections “is one of the worst investments possible”, because the money was pumped into the Hungarian opposition, “which, thank God, failed miserably”, he said. Szijjártó said this interference was still ongoing, insisting that a significant number of media outlets were “pushing propaganda” against the government’s pro-peace politics using foreign, including American, resources.

September 9, 2023

Slovakia to send 500 soldiers to Hungarian border

The Slovakian government led by Lajos Ódor adopted several measures to reduce the wave of refugees coming from Hungary. One of these is to send soldiers to the border.

The cabinet adopted measures to deal with the refugee crisis. Prime Minister Lajos Ódor said that the most important goal is people’s safety, 24.hu reports.

“We do not want to make any compromises on this issue. We want them to not only be safe, but to feel safe,”

Paraméter quotes Ódor as saying.

Lajos Ódor understands that it causes fear in some people when they see a large group of strangers in their surroundings, but he emphasized that the refugees have not committed any crimes so far. The government’s goal is to provide people with more thorough information. If this is lacking, fake news spreads, which some parties can exploit in the political struggle, he added.

500 soldiers at the Hungarian-Slovakian border

In the future, according to the needs, up to 500 soldiers will be able to help the police work. The prime minister justified this by saying that at the beginning of the summer, a few hundred refugees arrived every week, but now, a few thousand come weekly. The decision can free up police capacity, which can speed up the administration of refugees, since they don’t want to settle, they want to go on to Western countries.

The government would abolish the mandatory issuance of the so-called “Slovak residence certificate”. The reason is that refugees interpret it as a kind of residence permit, which authorises them to stay in the Schengen area. Because of the document, people smugglers only see themselves as passenger carriers when they take such refugees, 24.hu writes.

Number of refugees increased

Lajos Ódor admitted that the number of refugees had indeed increased. As he said, they are not coming from Mars, they are coming through Hungary, but the same number or maybe even more are trying to get into Austria from Hungary.

Ódor called the protection of the Schengen border and joint patrolling on the Hungarian side of the border important. The Slovak government does not want to introduce border controls, but there will be a greater police and military presence. According to the Prime Minister, a joint EU solution to the refugee situation must be found.

Read also:

September 7, 2023

Official: Hungarian government extends crisis status

The Hungarian government has extended the “crisis situation caused by mass immigration” until 7 March 2024. The news was published in the Hungarian Official Gazette on Tuesday evening. The current decree is to expire on 7 September.

A government decree published in the Hungarian Gazette on Tuesday evening shows that the Hungarian government has extended the “crisis situation caused by mass immigration” until 7 March 2024,

In recent years, Hungary has become a country of crises and emergencies, Telex writes. In recent years, Hungary has become a country of crises and emergencies. The “mass immigration crisis” was first declared in March 2016 and has been extended ever since. In addition, a “state of war” has been in place in the country since May last year.

In principle, the purpose of emergency legislation is to enable the government to respond effectively and quickly to problems that arise. In 2022, 267 government decrees were issued on the grounds of various emergencies, accounting for 18.5 percent of all legislation and 41.5 percent of all government decrees.

Read also:

September 6, 2023

Opposition inquires about releasing convicted smugglers, Fidesz: dollar left, Soros, Brussels, migrant ghettos

The opposition Democratic Coalition (DK) has written to Interior Minister Sándor Pintér with an enquiry about the release from Hungarian prisons of 1,385 foreign people smugglers.

The party wants to know whether the government is not concerned that their mass release may lead to the suspension of Hungary’s Schengen membership and the introduction of dangerous criminals and terrorists to Hungary, DK politician Géza Mustó told an online press briefing on Monday.

He also accused the government of allowing thousands of foreign guest workers to enter Hungary.

The ruling Fidesz party said in reaction that “the dollar left” backed “the migrant resettlement plans of Brussels and the Soros network”, would dismantle the border fence and “create migrant ghettos in Hungary”.

Fidesz, it added, insisted on strict border protection; hundreds of thousands of migrants had been prevented from entering the country in recent years.

The ruling party also referred to “aggressive” migrants who “often arrive at the border armed”. This year alone, police arrested 91,000 border violators and 700 people smugglers were hauled before the courts, it added.

It was “outrageous” that Brussels did not support border protection and expected foreign people smugglers to be held in Hungarian prisons at the taxpayers’ expense, the party said.

August 22, 2023

Hungarian police after head of people-smuggling ring

The police are after the head of a ring that smuggled at least 13 groups of people from Serbia to Hungary and helped them to reach Austria in 2021, investigators told MTI in a statement on Thursday.

The Iraqi national managed the operations of a 16-member gang from abroad, the police statement said.

The illegal migrants they smuggled into Hungary paid EUR 500 each for a trip from Serbia to Austria. According to the police’s findings, the organisers earned profits of over HUF 13 million (EUR 33,600) from some 150 migrants.

August 17, 2023

Surprisingly high number of migrants try to break through the Hungarian border

There are almost 500 border violations on the average weekday and even more at weekends, the prime minister’s chief domestic security adviser said on Wednesday.

György Bakondi told public television that the latest data show that 91,000 people tried to enter the border illegally this year and criminal proceedings were undertaken against 700 people smugglers who typically operated in large gangs.

He said that whereas armed violence on the Serbian side of the border had been confined to various migrant groups, a novel development was that a few days ago a local involved in community media in Hajdukovo (Hajdújárás) had been on the receiving end of a hand grenade attack. Also, illegal migrant activity has increased on the Italian and Balkan routes, Bakondi said.

Meanwhile, in another interview, he told public radio that it would be dangerous to set up an open refugee camp with capacity of 20,000-30,000 near the border town of Röszke because this would risk accepting people involved in shootings on the other side of the border. As already witnessed in Bicske and Debrecen in the past, having an open camp would pose extreme risks to Hungarian and European internal security, including social, health, educational and accommodation systems.

Guest workers in Hungary a security threat?

The opposition Jobbik-Conservatives party protests against the government using “Hungarian taxpayers’ money” to support the employment of foreign guest workers and has initiated a security screening of those workers whom the party considers “a security threat”, Jobbik politicians told a press conference on Tuesday.

Dániel Z. Kárpát, a lawmaker, said that central subsidy allocated by using taxpayers’ monies to three battery plants in support of creating jobs might have totalled 60 million forints (EUR 155,000). He added that those jobs were being filled for instance with “Kyrgyz and Filipino” guest workers.

“The government should use this money to subsidise jobs at Hungarian SMEs,” he said at the press conference held in front of the Samsung-owned battery plant in Göd, just north of Budapest. Zoltán Sas, the head of parliament’s national security committee, said he had submitted a written question to the minister overseeing the secret service to inquiry whether foreign guest workers arriving in Hungary were subjected to a security screening in advance.

A little boy died in a horrific accident in Hungary – UPDATED

A van capsized in Csongrád-Csanád County near Ásotthalom on the main road 55. The driver was a Russian citizen who forced 19 illegal migrants into the cargo hold, including three children. All illegal passengers suffered injuries, but a Syrian boy lost his life.

According to 444.hu, ten ambulance cars from two counties rushed to help the casualties. Six people suffered severe, while 12 minor injuries, including two other kids.

Prosecutors bring charges against people smuggler who caused fatal accident

Prosecutors have brought charges against a Moldovan man on suspicion of people smuggling and causing a fatal accident after he crashed his minibus into a ditch at Ásotthalom at dawn on Thursday. After midnight, the man picked up 19 illegal migrants claiming to be Syrian citizens with the intent of transporting them to Austria on the instructions of a client, Csongrád-Csanád County prosecutors said in a statement.

When police carried out a spot check on the outskirts of Ásotthalom, the suspect drove away at high speed and lost control of the car while taking a corner, crashing into a drainage ditch. One of the passengers died at the scene, while four suffered serious injuries. Fourteen sustained minor injuries. The suspect fled into the forest, and after a search of several hours, police took him into custody.

Hungary protecting Europe by helping Sahel

Europe would face ruin if migration from Africa’s Sahel region took off, a government official said in a newspaper interview. Referring to the unstable situation in Niger, Eduard László Mathé, the ministerial commissioner for government policy in sub-Sahara, told the weekly Mandiner that problems must be handled locally rather than giving in to “endless African migration”. The Hungarian government had been the first in Europe to recognise this.

Read about the only Hungarian national who escaped from Niger HERE.

The Sahel, Mathé added, served as the security frontier of Europe. Potentially, tens of millions of African migrants may head to Europe now. During its presidency of the European Union in 2024, Hungary will consistently stress the issues associated with the countries of the Sahel. This African region is inhabited by a mixed population of 90 million, consisting of both nomadic people and settlers. Countries with growing populations, the ministerial commissioner added, were highly vulnerable to climate change and food poverty.

Not long ago, a government delegation visited Chad and examined the possible outcomes of the worsening refugee crisis on the Chad-Sudan border, including a humanitarian crisis due to the Sudanese civil war. Mathé said that the problems Africa is facing at the moment could soon become the problems of the EU. Hungary, the state secretary added, has started to build strong relations with Niger and Chad, and it offered humanitarian relief in the hope of stabilising the region’s economies with a further view to protecting Europe. Mathé said Hungary, with its long-standing attention to the dangers inherent in North Africa, had been among the first to react to the coup in Niger, and its Western partners appreciated its engagement.

August 11, 2023

Fidesz accused of carrying out population replacement

Ruling Fidesz is carrying out “a population replacement” programme by bringing foreign guest workers to Hungary, the leader of the opposition Jobbik-Conservatives party said on Wednesday.

“Fidesz has been deceiving Hungarians with the message for years that some hidden powers are preparing to carry out a replacement of the European population,” Márton Gyöngyösi, a party MEP, told a press conference. “But it has turned out that Fidesz itself wants to load 500,000 guest workers onto Hungarian society,” he said, adding that they would mostly be intended to work in Chinese-owned battery plants for wages and under conditions Hungarian workers would not accept.

In the meantime, hundreds of thousands of young Hungarians are leaving the country seeking better quality education or a workplace that gives them more respect, Gyöngyösi said.

Jobbik rejects all forms of migration, be it Brussels’ quota system for resettling migrants to Hungary or Fidesz’s plan to settle migrant workers in Hungary, he said.

On another topic, Gyöngyösi was asked about the HUF 506 million (EUR 1.3m) received in foreign campaign donations by Budapest Mayor Gergely Karácsony’s movement for last year’s general election. He said he had asked in an open letter Karácsony as well as Péter Márki-Zay, the prime minister candidate of the united opposition, for clarification of “what exactly happened”. “We cannot accept that Jobbik be punished for monies of which we have not seen a single penny,” he said.

Márton Gyöngyösi:

August 9, 2023

Hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese, Kyrgyz, and Filipinos will come to work in Hungary

Zoltán Karácsony, an expert on HR Portal, told Világgazdaság that there are 25 licensed companies in Hungary bringing guest workers to Hungary from the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, Mongolia, and Kyrgyzstan.

Interestingly, the government campaigned before the 2015 migration crisis that no migrants could take the jobs of the Hungarians. However, the world has changed since then. Now, the Hungarian economy needs more and more workers, but the jobs it offers are no longer attractive for Hungarians. For example, we know the new Chinese battery plants will welcome thousands of guest workers.

The answer is easy. Hundreds of thousands of Hungarians live and work abroad. That is because they can get multiple times the Hungarian salaries in Austria, Germany, or the United Kingdom. Their workforce is badly needed in Hungary, but they will not return for such low-added value jobs offering non-compatible salaries. Therefore, Hungary needs guest workers.

No chance to remain in Hungary for the guest workers

According to the government-close Világgazdaság, they come mostly from Central and Southeastern Asia. It is probably not by chance that new flights are launched to these regions. For example, the one going to Uzbekistan’s Tashkent has been announced recently.

Mr Karácsony said that Hungarian companies could not find suitable workforce in the industry, service, and hotel sector. Világgazdaság argues that there can be 0.5 million new workplaces in Hungary in the next few years. Therefore, we need 200-300 thousand more guest workers above the current 100,000.

State secretary Sándor Czomba said last week that the parliament made it easier for them to come and work in Hungary. However, they will have no chance to remain here.

The number of open positions is rising. For example, Hungarian companies need welders, truck drivers (we wrote HERE about Indian female drivers coming to Hungary), and forklift drivers. Despite the parliament’s easing, the administration for the guest workers still lasts 14-15 weeks.

August 4, 2023

Only Hungarian in Niger rescued, migration wave will follow him?

A Hungarian man was on a cultural round trip in Niger when the coup d’état happened. As a result, the international airport was closed, so his flight never left the African country.

According to rtl.hu, the man was in the company of four Bulgarians. They participated in a Muslim religious celebration in Agadez and headed back to the capital when they got info about the airport’s closure. The Hungarian said locals remained peaceful even after the national guard arrested the democratically elected president.

Thanks to the help of the Hungarian consular office in Tripoli, Libya, they could leave the country on board a military plane of the Italian army. But the Hungarian citizen had to pay for the route back to Vienna and the bus travel to Budapest. He said they were not saved because there was no danger, but were helped a lot by the Hungarian diplomacy, chiefly the consular office in Tripoli. The Bulgarian diplomacy did not help the group, he added.

Government: Niger crisis to impact migration situation in Europe

The crisis in Niger threatens to impact security and migration in Europe, the state secretary responsible for aiding persecuted Christians told MTI on Thursday. Until the coup on 27 July, Niger was “one of the last stable states of the Sahel”, Tristan Azbej said. Upending the stability in the region would have grave consequences on security and migration in the Mediterranean and Europe, he said. The region’s countries serve as source and transit countries of migration, he added.

Azbej noted that during his visit to Niger in May, the country showed signs of another kind of impending crisis: the desertification of the southern regions had triggered a food shortage, he said. Since the Nigerien fertility rate is one of the highest in the world, Hungary’s proposal to support the local Catholic Church’s education programmes was welcomed warmly, he said. Countries in the region have recently collapsed one after the other, Azbej said. Mali is ravaged by armed conflicts, Burkina Faso has seen several coups this year, and a civil war has pushed Sudan to the brink of a humanitarian crisis, he said.

All that increased the significance of Niger, which functioned as a democratic country until last week, he said. So far, it has managed to contain the humanitarian and migration crises caused by terrorists in the country, he said. In the wake of last week’s coup, now looms the threat of a humanitarian crisis, armed conflict and migration towards Europe, he added. Azbej warned that the number of migrants leaving Africa for Europe could reach 100 million in the coming year, and “there is no border protection in Europe to handle such a wave.”

Hungary and the EU are pushing for a diplomatic solution to restore peace, he said. Since its launch in 2017, Hungary’s aid programme, Hungary Helps, has focused on the Middle East and the Sahel: Mali, Niger and northern Nigeria, he said, where it works to avoid humanitarian crises and to help Christian communities persecuted by Islamist terror organisations, he added.

Featured image: illustration

August 4, 2023