Chaos at the Hungarian borders with Ukraine and Serbia – VIDEOS
People returning from their vacations and guest workers going home were trying to cross the borders in such huge groups that practically paralysed traffic at the borders of Ukraine and Serbia.
Every year in summer, when most people go on vacation and then return home, borders become incredibly crowded, and border officers are overwhelmed. This summer might be even busier due to last year’s lost summer vacations. Hungary’s borders with Serbia on South Ukraine on the North-East experienced a particularly big crowd in the past two days.
How to travel to Hungary this summer
On Sunday, those who wished to cross the border by car at Röszke in the South had to wait for several hours to do so.
The crossing point was so crowded that until 7 pm, only those entering Hungary were allowed to cross.
The police advised people who were heading to Serbia to choose smaller crossing points. At around 6 pm, there was a five-km-long queue on the Serbian side with a waiting time of four hours, according to Magyar Szó.
On the Ukrainian border, the situation was very similar, though people found a faster way to continue their travel. At around midday on Monday, a dozen buses were stuck in the traffic at Csap, wanting to leave Hungary and enter Ukraine. Guest workers heading home travelled on the buses.
The traffic jam formed because of border patrol, who demanded a security deposit worth the value of those buses having a foreign licence plate.
Those cars and buses with a Ukrainian plate could cross without a problem.
After several hours spent waiting, the crowd was so outraged that people started to get off the buses and walked towards the border crossing point,
wrote KISZó.
However, the armed border patrol stood in their way; thus, the whole traffic was completely paralysed.
The crossing point at Csap was not the only one in such a difficult situation. Several others on the Ukrainian border experienced a chaotic situation. At Nevetlenfalu, for instance, the IT system shut down on Monday morning and was out of order until the afternoon, writes index.hu. People trying to get home at several other crossing points experienced four-hour-long waiting times.
A physical fight among some drivers almost broke out when lining into the lanes at the gates.
Read alsoThe number of illegal border crossings is on the rise in Hungary
Source: index.hu, kiszo.net, police.hu, magyarszo.rs