Hungary’s Justice Minister Judit Varga drew a clear distinction between Ukrainian refugees who wait respectfully for admission and aggressive illegal migrants who breach borders and attack the authorities in an interview with Breitbart News.
This is part one of an interview with Judit Varga, Hungary’s Minister of Justice.
Speaking to Breitbart London following the fourth consecutive victory of Viktor Orbán’s national-conservative Fidesz-KDNP Party Alliance in parliamentary elections this April, Minister Varga addressed the question of Hungary having opened its borders to hundreds of thousands of refugees from neighbouring Ukraine, despite having fiercely defended its borders against previous waves of migration — often in the teeth of European Union opposition.
“There are clear differences between the refugees coming from Ukraine and illegal migrants,” said the mother of three.
“Ukrainian refugees use the official crossing points, where they wait patiently, show respect, register and are thankful for our help. On the other hand, illegal immigrants assisted by pro-migration NGOs regularly breach the borders, attack police officers, behave aggressively and refuse to cooperate with the authorities,” she explained.
“Hungarian authorities consequently do not allow into the country those not coming from a neighbouring war-torn country but from thousands of kilometres away, passing through several safe states,” she went on, describing a situation similar to the ever-worsening boat migrants crisis in the English Channel, which has seen tens of thousands of migrants travelling to Britain from safe France, usually having passed through many other safe countries en route.
Minister Varga described the Orbán administration’s firm stance on illegal immigration in terms of Hungary’s historic mission of defending “Christian Europe” — a role she said the country had been fulfilling “for centuries”.
“We may no longer use castles and fortresses, like in the Middle Age, instead we built up an extensive barrier while our soldiers and border guards patrol day and night to defend the continent,” explained the polyglot politician, who speaks English, French, German, and Spanish in addition to her native tongue.
“The whole of Europe could be grateful for the Hungarian government’s quick response to illegal migration,” she said — the “could” perhaps being key, given the European Union and left-liberal EU governments such as that in Sweden have put great pressure on the country to accept compulsory migrant redistribution quotas, and even called for Budapest to face sanctions for declining to, as they put it, “take responsibility with relation to migration”.
Minister Varga suggested that, indeed, “Brussels wants to take revenge for the victory of the national conservative side in Hungary” in the April elections, and that it “insists on the punishment of our country with tooth and nail” despite the challenges it is currently facing as one of the EU’s frontline states taking in Ukrainian refugees.
Breitbart London previously interviewed the new President of Hungary, Katalin Novák, when she was Minister for Family Affairs in 2021. Read part one here and part two here.
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