Illegal migration has no winners, it has beneficiaries at most, the Minister heading the Prime Minister’s Office stressed in his address opening the Budapest migration conference of the Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MEE) on Friday.

Gergely Gulyás said “the beneficiaries are the philanthropist money man who is happy to provide loans for managing migration which he himself supports and seeks to present as a fundamental human right,” the criminal underworld which organises modern-day people smuggling, and the left wing of the political class which sees new voters in those given refugee status and citizenship to replace their former supporters who have turned away from them.

Further beneficiaries of illegal migration are also the industries which take part in providing care for the new arrivals from public funds.

Mass migration which does not result in integration is equally bad for the issuer countries which stand to lose entire generations, for those setting out and finding their lives in danger, and for the countries whose taxpayers are footing the bill of integration which will never happen and the collapse of public security, Mr Gulyás said.

He said irresponsible decision-makers want to change the image of the continent by presenting Europe’s citizens with a fait accompli. Some players on the international stage call into question the right of people and nations to decide themselves on issues which determine their own fates for decades or even centuries, the Minister said, describing migration as the most burning and biggest problem of our time.

He stressed that it is particularly important to repeat the truth over and over again in a world where the truth is being “stifled by political correctness”.

The past few years have proved that migration is not the right answer to demographic problems, and neither does it solve the problems of workforce shortages, he observed.

He highlighted that the Hungarian government sees the solution in supporting families even if a successful programme can only yield tangible results over the course of many long years.

Mr Gulyás also said no one disputes that richer countries must help their poorer counterparts. The only question is how they do so. He pointed out that Hungary is proud of its role in peacekeeping missions, and believes that help must be taken where there is trouble. He mentioned as a positive example the Hungary Helps Programme which directly addresses the specific problems of local communities.

The head of the Prime Minister’s Office further highlighted that “migration appears to have become the touchstone of the rule of law”. He recalled that Hungary, similar to the United States, did not join the UN’s global migration compact.

“We have since observed that as part of a kind of stealthy legislative process attempts are being made over and over again to smuggle the legal body of the UN resolution into international and even EU conventions,” said Mr Gulyás who believes that this, too, clearly indicates what we could expect on the issue of migration unless at the May EP elections a clear message is relayed to those who have done nothing against migration or have positively supported it in the past few years.

He underlined that Hungary and Italy have shown in recent years that migration can be stopped if there is a will and there is courage. The only possible solution to the process is the assessment of asylum applications within the boundaries of the rule of law, but outside the European borders, he pointed out.

Mr Gulyás said it is a decisive question as to whether “we can forge another spiritual renewal in defence of the European way of life and Christian culture, one which provides a robust background for strengthening Europe’s identity”.

(MTI)