Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has said that migration poses the greatest threat to Europe’s future, which should be protected.
The prime minister made the comment while meeting Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz in Vienna on Tuesday.
“There exists a Christian culture and a way of life, which we would like to protect,” PM Orbán said. He added that we should preserve Europe’s identity and Christian foundations.
He said that the Schengen regime can also be protected “if we want to protect it”. He emphasized that the external borders of the Schengen area should remain closed while the internal ones should be kept open.
PM Orbán said Chancellor Kurz had been a “good partner” to Hungary on the issue of migration even back when he was foreign minister. He noted that Kurz also agreed with the need to seal the Western Balkan migration route.
The prime minister added that he and Kurz agreed that migrant quotas were an ineffective way to handle the migration crisis. No one who entered Europe illegally can be allowed to stay, the prime minister said.
He said Europe’s migrant redistribution mechanism “is also destroying Schengen”, arguing that the EU was also trying to force it onto countries that protect their borders from illegal migrants. The prime minister expressed hope that the EU would “get back on the right path”.
Chancellor Kurz called for a new European asylum system and said that receiving countries should be the ones to decide whom they want to admit. The chancellor also agreed on the need to preserve and strengthen the Schengen system.