“The UN will be making the same mistake with its Global Compact for Migration than the European Union did with its mandatory resettlement quotas”, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó pointed out in his speech during a session of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) Ministerial Council in Milan on Thursday.

“The UN’s Global Compact will cause much greater problems that the EU’s quotas, since the latter is restricted to Europe, while the former will disrupt the whole world”, he added. “The UN is exaggerating only the positive side of migration in a deceptive manner, while disregarding the security risks, and also painting a deceptive picture by declaring migration to be a fundamental human right”, the Minister declared.

Mr. Szijjártó recalled that Europe was caught totally by surprise by the wave of migration in 2015, and 400 thousand illegal immigrants marched through Hungary, providing direct experience. Of the lessons that must be learned, he cited in first place the fact that mass illegal migration processes are dangerous. Secondly, he explained that uncontrolled migration provides an opportunity for terrorist organisations to get their fighters to places that were previously peaceful. The Minister added that migration processes destabilise both source and transit countries, while causing extremely serious problems in destination countries.

“We had to experience the fact that the vast majority of migrants are not prepared to respect local customs, laws, culture and behavioural expectations”, he said. He added that as a consequence of mass illegal migration, the threat of terrorism in Europe is higher than ever before, as clearly indicated by the over thirty attacks that have been committed by people with immigrant backgrounds. In his speech, the Minister said: “Hungary recommends that OSCE cooperation should concentrate of preventing and stopping further waves of illegal migration”, noting that the countries of Central Asia should be supported in the fight against terrorism, and in successfully curbing extremist ideologies that are the hotbeds of terrorism.

Mr. Szijjártó also called for the OSCE to reject all initiatives that could lead to new waves of migration, because these represent a security risk to the European region. In his speech, the Minister called the UN Global Compact for Migration such an initiative, which if it adopts, “the United Nations will be making the same mistake as the European Union did with the mandatory resettlement quotas”.

“The adoption of the Compact represents a major security risk for the whole OSCE region, but seven OSCE member states and two partner countries reject the Global Compact, meaning nine countries are placing the security of their own citizens first”, Mr. Szijjártó pointed out. He also asked the other OSCE member states to consider whether they truly want to spend taxpayers’ money on campaigns promoting the favourable effects of migration and on training migrants, and whether they truly believe that migrants should be assured the same services along their migration route as the taxpaying citizens of the given country, and whether they truly want to ban the sharing of data acquired during the provision of care to migrants with the immigration authorities.

(MTI/Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade)