But he mad clear that as “a second option” he wants “first to talk with the Visegrad Group”, made up of Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Poland “and European prime ministers on whether to close the Hungarian border with Croatia” for migrants. “But so far there are no indications or information that Germany is to change its policy”, Erjavec told a news conference.
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This could quickly come to a halt now as Hungary’s fence is finished on the Croatian border as well.
We have urged Greece and the European Council to put together a joint European force to protect the external Schengen border.
If Hungary decides to stop the flow through its territory altogether, migrants might try to go through Slovenia instead.
EU member Hungary is on the southern frontier of Europe’s passport-free Schengen zone, which has come under intense pressure as the European Union faces its biggest migrant crisis since 1945.
Having travelled up from Greece through the western Balkans, all but a few have continued their journey, crossing into Austria and then further north, often to Germany and Scandinavia.
Hungary had created two so-referred to as transit zones on its border with Serbia, the place migrants can submit an asylum request, however most such requests are rejected, as a result of Hungary considers Serbia a protected nation for refugees. “We will introduce stricter controls to be able to block border crossings done illegally”, Szijjarto said.
According to Hungarian police data, 5,000 to 8,000 migrants crossed the Croatian border each day in recent weeks and were shipped in an organized way by police to the Austrian border.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban is pushing for the Greek border to be sealed in a bid to curb the flow of migrants from the Middle East making their way into Europe.
Once the border is closed, it is unclear what Croatian authorities will do, with its foreign minister on Wednesday having ruled out erecting “walls or fences” along its border with Serbia.
The four prime ministers said the Czech Republic and Slovakia will each deploy 50 police officers to Hungary s border while Poland will deploy between 50 and 60 police officers as well as five specially equipped vehicles.
Hungary hopes an agreement can be reached in Brussels that will close off Greece’s borders to migrants, since “that would be the best solution”, Mr. Orban said.
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He has drawn flak for his warnings about the dangers posed by the arrival into Europe of large numbers of Muslim immigrants. “That’s only for those who have worked for it”, he said.
