In a meeting with the Bavarian President, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán highlighted how the Hungarian border was protecting European freedom. Breitbert.com today reports on how the Hungarian immigration policy has indeed changed opinions in Europe.
The website writes that the meeting of Hungarian PM Orbán with Christian Social Union (CSU) leader and Germany government coalition partner Horst Seehofer is the third between the pair since the start of the migrant crisis. Both leaders have been in agreement on issues during the crisis, advocating for tougher border controls and positive measures to tackle the massive flow of migrants.
In the latest meeting this week, PM Orbán defended the policies of his government and the outcome of the Hungarian referendum on the redistribution of migrants, reports Der Spiegel. Speaking to the Bavarian legislature, PM Orbán said that his government’s stance on mass migration was a positive move to defend the values of European civilization.
PM Orbán compared the Hungarian policy with the opening of the border with Austria in 1989 that allowed Germans and others to flee the oppressive communist regime saying: “In 1989, we acted for the freedom of Europe and now we’re protecting this freedom.”
“I promise you that Hungary will also in the future always be on the side of European freedom," he added,
The Hungarian leader was invited to Bavaria by Seehofer to speak on the 60th anniversary of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. The uprising was squashed by the Soviet Union, causing some 200,000 Hungarians to flee the country.
Opponents to Orbán’s migrant policies attempt to use this fact against his government though Hungarian government spokesman Zoltan Kovács has said the two issues are completely different.
Speaking exclusively to Breitbart London earlier in October, he wrote that “the border that the ‘56ers crossed was a political demarcation between two states that have had a close relationship for centuries” as opposed to the current migrants whose “culture…most definitely does not have that relationship with our Judeo-Christian culture”.
While opposition parties in Bavaria criticized the CSU leader for inviting Orbán, some calling the Hungarian Prime Minister the “destroyer of Europe” and an “autocrat”, the Bavarian president defended his actions saying, “there is no substitute for dialogue”.