If due to coronavirus infections an epicentre were to develop in a refugee centre in Greece, based on the regulations of the World Health Organization (WHO), it should be quarantined, the Chief Security Advisor to the Prime Minister said on the Friday evening programme of the public service television news channel M1.

György Bakondi spoke about this in the context of the fact for the first time that since the outbreak of the coronavirus epidemic, the virus has been found in the body of an illegal immigrant who lives in a refugee centre located on an island in the Aegean Sea. According to information released by the semi-official Greek news agency ANA-MPA on Thursday, the test of a 35-year-old Yemeni migrant proved positive in the Vial refugee centre situated on the Island of Chios.

The chief security advisor said, according to estimates, there could be as many as 250 to 280 positive cases among migrants. At the same time, he also drew attention to the fact that it is impossible to tell how many migrants could be infected.

Mr Bakondi was also asked about the fact that on Friday the police found another tunnel near the temporary security fence in Bács-Kiskun County, not far from the place where on Thursday evening police officers detained 25 illegal migrants.

The chief security advisor said this method is also known on the US-Mexican, Greek-Turkish and Bulgarian-Turkish borders. Migrants utilise this method in order to bypass the security features of the fence that would alert the authorities. The Hungarian authorities make every effort around the clock to detect and to apprehend illegal migrants in the vicinity of the border, Mr Bakondi said.

(MTI/Cabinet Office of the Prime Minister)