EU court fines Hungary

In the latest of his highly opinionated columns, a pro-government pundit vituperates against the court ruling.

The European Union’s top court has slapped an unprecedented €200 million fine on Hungary for failing to follow the Union’s asylum policies. Hungary will also have to pay a penalty of €1 million a day until it changes its policy. The European Court of Justice said Budapest was in breach of a 2020 judgment that it had violated EU laws by only accepting asylum requests at its consulates abroad rather than at its borders. PM Orbán said Hungary will not give in to financial blackmail by Brussels bureaucrats.

In Magyar Nemzet, Zsolt Bayer argues that Hungary is rightfully defending itself from the inflow of clandestine mass immigration. He also mentions that by not letting those immigrants through, Hungary also protects the European Union. Most of the people illegally crossing several safe countries, he writes, are obviously not entitled to be granted asylum, as their lives are not in jeopardy in their countries. The minority entitled to international protection, Bayer quotes the Geneva Convention on refugees, should wait in the first secure country until the state of their choice grants them asylum. He also rejects the accusation that by not letting unlawful migrants in, Hungary lays the burden on other EU countries. Bayer retorts that Hungary has spent €2 billion on its border fence to protect the rest of Europe. ’This is not a court; these are scoundrels’, Bayer concludes.

Tags: European Court, migration, Orbán