The developments in the immigration field are rapid with the turn of Germany, which announced its plans to close the borders. It is recalled that this decision has caused strong reactions in Europe, including Greece, as expressed by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
At the same time, Hungary is ready to file a lawsuit against the European Commission asking it to cover the costs it has paid to protect the European Union’s external borders, which Budapest says has cost it around 2 billion euros, its chief of staff said. Prime Minister Viktor Orban.
The nationalist Orban closed a major route through Hungary that hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers fleeing war and poverty had followed in 2015, boosting his support at home but drawing criticism from many allies in the EU.
“We are ready to file a lawsuit against the European Commission after it partially or fully covered the costs incurred by other member states to protect the borders of the Schengen area,” said Gergeli Gulias at a press conference today.
“Hungary has spent two billion euros on protecting the borders of the Schengen area in the past years, without receiving any serious contribution from the EU.”
Orban signaled he believed he was being vindicated after Germany announced plans on Monday to impose tighter controls on all its land borders in what he said was an effort to tackle irregular immigration.
Checks in what is normally an extensive area of free movement – Europe’s Schengen Area – will begin on September 16 and will initially last six months, reversing Berlin’s previous open-door policy.
“We can see that there are changes in Europe,” said Gulias. “In 2015 the Hungarian Prime Minister was the first to clearly state that if the EU does not enforce Community law and the Schengen Agreement, … then Schengen will collapse.”
Gulias emphasized that Berlin’s decision to impose border controls from Monday means that Germany is destroying the area of free movement within the EU.
“First he destroyed it by not making EU member states effectively protect their external borders and now he is destroying it by imposing internal border controls,” he underlined.
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