Hungary ready to open corridor for migrants to go to western Europe: Premier

By Mehmet Yilmaz

BUDAPEST (AA) - Hungary is ready to open an corridor for migrants to go to western Europe, the country’s premier said Friday.

Viktor Orban said Hungary will not change its stance on the issue and is ready to open a corridor for migrants to go to Austria, Germany and even Sweden, but it rejects Brussels' attempt to impose its opinion on Hungary.

Orban said during his weekly address on state-run Kossuth Radio, that Budapest fenced its borders in 2015 to prevent the entry of migrants, and Greece, Bulgaria, Spain, Slovenia, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia and Poland followed suit.

He pointed out that migration has been on the rise recently and 92,000 illegal border entries were prevented from Jan. 1 to October. He said that figure was 21,000 during the same period in 2020.

Underlining Hungary spent about 600 billion Hungarian forints ($1.9 billion) on border protection from its national budget, Orban said at least a part of the money should be covered by the EU.

* Writing by Seda Sevencan