Hungary wants EU to support Jordan as refugee host

AMMAN — Hungary is reaching out to other EU countries in a bid to enlist assistance for countries hosting refugees, Hungarian Ambassador to Jordan Csaba Czibere said.

In an interview with The Jordan Times on Saturday, the diplomat said his country will offer “concrete proposals with short-term impact” regarding the refugee crisis in the EU Council’s extraordinary session convening this Wednesday.

Priorities, according to the Hungarian proposal, would be to defend the borders by helping Greece comply with its border protection obligations, and to help the countries hosting Syrian refugees, mainly Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey.

“The EU should be ready to cover all the costs that are not available,” Czibere said, adding that international contributions are “significant yet inadequate”.

The current refugee crisis reminded Europeans of the essential role of countries like Jordan, which has been offering a “huge sacrifice for long years”, the ambassador said, highlighting the efforts of the Kingdom, as well as Lebanon and Turkey, in hosting Syrian refugees.

The diplomat said there might be two ways for Europe to support countries hosting Syrian refugees: The first is that each of the member states give additional funds; the second is by looking for sources of funds in the budget of the EU.

“[Syrian] refugees in neighbouring countries to Syria are safe and their efforts are needed to reconstruct their country once it is peaceful; if they travel thousands of kilometres, it is unlikely that they will ever return home,” he said.

Illegal crossings

The ambassador, whose country was flooded with refugees and immigrants over the past months, said Budapest has spent 200 million euros this year to meet its Schengen obligations, in reference to the EU agreement which established the borderless European zone allowing free passage of people and vehicles.

This year alone, increasingly in the summer, the number of illegal crossings into Hungary over the 170-kilometre-long border with Serbia exceeded 200,000, while Schengen rules allow crossing only at designated crossings, Czibere explained.

To face this problem, Hungary built a fence, which proved to be “the only effective physical solution based on NATO standards for physical barriers” to address the issue of illegal crossings.

Refugee registration

Since the beginning of this year until the middle of September, Hungary registered over 172,000 immigrants from 100 different nationalities who asked for refugee status out of the 200,000 who illegally crossed into the country without documents, the diplomat told The Jordan Times.

Around 67,000 (40 per cent) of registered immigrants are Syrians, while the number of Afghans reached 44,000, followed by Kosovars (23,000), Pakistanis (15,000), Iraqis (6,000) and Bangladeshis (4,000). 

“This does not seem to be a solely Syrian refugee crisis… this is a diverse group with different objectives,” he said, adding that the majority of immigrants are single young males.

Hungary is merely a “transit country” for the majority of immigrants on their way to other countries, mainly Germany and Sweden, as asylum seekers eye better educational and economic opportunities or social benefits there.

Still people who register as refugees in Hungary get shelter, food and healthcare, among other benefits.

But for Hungary and other European countries, it would be more feasible and beneficial to offer more assistance to refugee-hosting countries neighbouring Syria, he stressed.