Refugees should be helped to stay where they are and a clear distinction should be made between economic migrants and those refugees whom we have always helped and will continue to do so, Minister of Human Capacities Zoltán Balog told national news agency MTI on Tuesday in Paris.

Mr. Balog was attending a Paris conference on helping persecuted minorities, with participants from 56 states and 11 international organisations. He said that the focus of the conference was how to prevent Middle Eastern minorities from being forced to flee, and how to create conditions enabling them to safely return to their homes and live there. Another important aspect was the preservation of the millennium-long culture of these communities.

Mr. Balog told MTI that in his speech he mentioned that in 2013-14 Hungary – without any publicity – gave asylum to 1,000 Eastern Christian families from Iraq and Egypt, granting them Hungarian citizenship and also leaving open the possibility for them to return home whenever they wish. The Government accepted these families based on the recommendations of local Christian communities. He said that all these families were genuine refugees who had been forced to flee. “We took them in and we are prepared to do so in the future, but only in this safe manner,” Mr. Balog said. He also reiterated that the Hungarian armed forces are providing security for the Erbil refugee camp in Iraq, at a cost of several billion forints.

The Minister said that many seek to portray the construction of the Hungarian border barrier as inhumane, whereas “the struggle is not between humanity and inhumanity, but between those who know what they want and those who are clueless.” He said that the latter include the majority of European leaders, who cannot decide what message to send to migrants, thus “creating chaos by simultaneously saying that they can come and that they cannot come.” Mr. Balog said that “Our message is clear, in that we say that they should not come because it is pointless, that assistance should be provided to enable them to stay where they are, and that a clear distinction should be made between economic migrants and those refugees whom we have always helped and will continue to help. On the other hand, we cannot accept others unlawfully forcing us to turn our country into a refugee camp, thereby also creating a threat to Europe.” He said that Hungary’s contribution to a political solution was that it was the first country to support the European Council and European Commission resolutions declaring that the persecution of Christians causes irreparable damage to mankind, leading to the destruction of a two thousand-year-old culture. “To a country with a Christian background such as Hungary, that is an unacceptable loss”, Mr. Balog said.

Participants proposed that the International Criminal Court should declare the crimes of the Jihadist Islamic State against people and cultural heritage to be crimes against humanity. Mr. Balog said that humanitarian efforts should be focused on providing assistance to the existing huge refugee camps in neighbouring countries such as Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq. “Christians there don’t really want to leave, because they want to safeguard the two thousand years of culture established by their ancestors.” He said that for these reasons conditions in the refugee camps should be improved. “Governments there have taken a heavy burden upon themselves, and Europe should provide assistance”, he said.

French foreign minister Laurent Fabius pledged a French donation of EUR 25 million towards a fund to assist those returning home, and to rebuild schools and homes. Mr. Balog said that communication should also be improved and human trafficking groups targeted, so that middle-class refugees “do not spend their savings on being brought to Europe for nothing.” The conference was called by the U.N. Security Council in March this year and will be followed by a similar one in Spain in early 2016.

(Ministry of Human Capacities)