By Ayhan Simsek
BERLIN (AA) – German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban set out starkly different views on refugee crisis in a tense joint news conference following their meeting in Berlin on Thursday.
Merkel defended her humanitarian approach on the refugee crisis and stressed that she decided to open borders for refugees in 2015 due to exceptional circumstances at that time.
“We should always remember, and we should never forget that it is about human beings…this is also about one of the basic messages of Europe, and it is humanity,” she said.
Challenging Merkel’s approach during the news conference, Orban argued that this was serving as a “pull factor”, encouraging more migrants to try entering Europe.
Instead, the Hungarian prime minister advocated stricter measures at the EU’s external borders, to stop illegal crossings.
“It is unfair that many in Germany accuse us of not showing enough solidarity. In fact, in Hungary some 8,000 armed guards are conducting 24-hour patrols at the border,” he said.
Orban argued that in the absence of such measures by Hungary, thousands of migrants would have come to Germany everyday.
Merkel has been under growing pressure at home to address the refugee issue.
She has recently agreed to stricter measures, after her coalition partner CSU’s leader and Interior Minister Horst Seehofer threatened to quit the government.
Germany received more than a million refugees in the last thee years, mostly from Syria and Iraq.
Merkel’s decision in 2015 to open doors for refugees fleeing conflicts and persecution was widely criticized by conservatives, and was exploited by the far-right and populist parties.
