Government Spokesman Zoltán Kovács says it is outrageous that The New York Times is comparing refugees in transit zones to the victims of the Holocaust.

In a post on his personal blog on Friday, the Government Spokesman quoted a report published on Tuesday by The New York Times in which the paper writes that by May hundreds of asylum seekers already in Hungary may be “relocated to the detention camps, evoking ugly and unavoidable echoes of rounding up Jews, Roma and others during World War II.”

According to Mr. Kovács, “that comparison is so wrong and so outright offensive it probably ranks among the most outrageous statements about Hungary that we’ve seen in the media in years”.

The people living in the camps built in the transit area along Hungary’s border, which is the south-eastern border of the European Union’s Schengen Area, are awaiting a decision on their requests for asylum. Needless to say, an altogether different fate awaited the Jews, Roma and others rounded up during the Second World War. We’ve reached a truly low point if I have to explain the difference to The New York Times, the Government Spokesman writes in his response.

Mr. Kovács rejected the fact that the article referred to the transit zones as “prison camps”, when in fact people are free to leave at any time. “People awaiting a ruling on their asylum requests are free to leave, returning the way they came, but they are not free to wander about in Schengen Europe”, he added, justifying this with the terrorist attacks that have occurred in Europe recently, the perpetrators of which “exploited Europe’s porous borders and lax asylum procedures”.

“Hungary has a Government that takes responsibility for the safety and security of its citizens - as well as the citizens of Europe - and we will not apologize for making security a priority”, Mr. Kovács stressed.

(MTI)