Her violent reaction Vein caused by her decision Hungarian government release hundreds Foreigners who were convicted of smuggling of undocumented immigrantswhich is expected to have a direct impact on migratory flows To Austria. “We think they are sending a completely wrong message in this way,” Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Sulenberg said yesterday ahead of a meeting of his European counterparts in Brussels, adding that he would ask Budapest for “detailed clarifications.” The release of traffickers “will have a direct impact on our national security,” Sulenberg said.

Yesterday afternoon, the Hungarian ambassador to Austria was summoned to the Foreign Ministry for urgent consultations, and earlier, Austrian Interior Minister Gerhard Karner tightened controls on the border with Hungary. The issue, which has caused tension in diplomatic relations between the two neighboring countries of Central Europe, was the subject of a telephone conversation between Sulenberg and his Hungarian counterpart, Peter Cisarto. The latter defended his government’s controversial choice, arguing that it was a “sovereign state” decision. During another press briefing after speaking with Sullenberg, he said: “We have made the decision to extradite foreign criminals because it is better for them to leave our country.”

Last month, the government of the nationalist Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban issued a decree allowing the early release of foreign nationals accused of illegal immigration trafficking, provided they leave the country within 72 hours of release. He cited overcrowding in Hungarian prisons and the excessive burden of supporting traffickers on taxpayers as the main reasons for this decision.

“How overcrowded the country’s prisons are, the government’s decision not to spend taxpayers’ money on supporting several hundred traffickers,” said Gergeriy Gulyas, head of Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s office.

The Hungarian government appears to be intransigent on immigration while quietly encouraging an influx of migrants from Asia.

However, Vienna saw in this argument a sign of hypocrisy on the part of the Hungarian government, which otherwise seems completely uncompromising on immigration, to the point of being criticized by European institutions for human rights violations. “The justification that jailing foreign traffickers is too expensive is diametrically opposed to Hungary’s alleged hard line on migrant smuggling,” the Austrian foreign ministry said in a statement.

The main purpose

Austria is a key destination for migrants arriving in Hungary via the Balkan corridor with the help of smuggling groups. Once they manage to find themselves in a European Union country, in this case Hungary, migrants can move relatively easily to other Schengen countries. The route through Hungary remains one of the most popular alternatives for undocumented migrants, despite Budapest beefing up border patrols and erecting a steel border wall following the 2023 migration crisis.

Viktor Orban, who has ruled Hungary since 2010, has invested heavily in curbing immigration flows, arguing that non-European migrants threaten his country’s Christian identity. On the other hand, it wasn’t until May 3 that he pushed through a law facilitating the arrival of immigrants from Asian countries to address labor shortages. According to official statistics, the number of immigrants from Asian countries – Indonesians in industry, Mongolians in agriculture, Indian truck drivers, etc. – doubled between 2021 and 2022, which the French newspaper Le Monde describes as evidence of hypocrisy. Agencies specializing in assisting temporary Asian migrant workers are working with government agencies to meet the growing needs of the private sector for labor.

Effervescence in education

Thousands of pupils, teachers and students have been protesting in Budapest over the past few weeks against a government bill that undermines teachers’ status as civil servants and their right to strike. Central to the protesters’ demands, often met with tear gas and batons by police, are higher wages for teachers and government spending on education. With inflation at about 24% per year, the already meager incomes of teachers (Hungary ranks second in the list of all OSCE countries) are reduced to catastrophic levels. Some 5,000 teachers are threatening to leave the profession at the end of this season unless effective action is taken. The education movement is the only worrying “opposition” currently opposing the Orban government after its landslide election victory last year.