“In view of the fact that the UN Compact for Migration will be mandatory for member states, Hungary must exit the adoption process and make it absolutely clear that it in no way regards any of the measures or guidelines included in the migration package as applicable to itself”, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó said in a statement to Hungarian news agency MTI on Friday in New York.
The Minister is attending the series of negotiations on the United Nations Global Compact for Migration.
With relation to the negotiations, Mr. Szijjártó told the press that the drafting of the text of the Global Compact has now been completed, and the two co-chairs entrusted with drawing up of the text will be passing on the proposals they have prepared to the President of the United Nations General Assembly, who will put forward a proposal for the adoption of the Compact at the summit of heads of state and government scheduled to be held in Marrakech, Morocco, in December.
The Minister stressed that the final text of the Global Compact “is totally at odds with common sense, Hungary’s interests and the intent to restore European security”. “This package aims to encourage migration processes in an insane manner, and it only took into account the interests of Africa, Latin America and small island states when it determined migration to be a fundamental human right. This is a false approach”, he pointed out.
He said that in his opinion at the same time the package “does not deal at all with the existing fundamental human rights of people who want to live in secure and peaceful conditions in their own homelands”. According to the text, humans are the focus of attention, but this is not the case, because the package “only takes into account the interest of migrants”, he stated.
The Foreign Minister also spoke about the fact that the package prescribes obligations for member states that can be interpreted by migrants as an invitation, and the implementation of which will give rise to another wave of millions of immigrants. “The Compact wants to make it mandatory for countries to provide all services to migrants along the whole length of their migration route, and that these services must be the same as those that they provide to their own citizens”, he explained. “In addition, the migrants must be continuously provided with information, as well as with the opportunity to communicate with their relatives at home”, he added.
“The package also wants to makes it mandatory for countries to provide training to migrants both before and after their arrival, to expand opportunities to lodge complaints with the involvement of NGOs, to provide discounts on the cost of their bank transfers home, to transfer illegal immigrants to a legal status instead of sending them home, and to continuously increase receiving capacities”, he said. “Furthermore, border protection will have to be handled as a human rights issue, not a security issue”, he added.
In the Minister’s opinion, these measures will endanger the countries that apply them and will give rise to further waves of mass migration.
Mr. Szijjártó stressed that in contrast to previous claims, the Global Compact for Migration will become part of the international legal system and will serve as a point of reference with relation to the application of both national and international law; this is why it states that all countries must develop their own national programme for the application and implementation of the measures included in the package.
“This is the same process that they succeeded in achieving in the European Union with relation to the quotas; first they made it appear as if the quotas would be voluntary, but in the end they became mandatory”, he noted.
The Minister said that in view of the fact that the Compact states that national programmes must be drawn up for its implementation, at Wednesday’s Cabinet meeting he will be proposing that Hungary exits the adoption process relating to the Global Compact for Migration and makes it absolutely clear that it in no way regards any of the measures or guidelines included in the migration package as applicable to itself.
(MTI)
