Poland and Hungary are still sticking to their unwillingness to accept any refugees despite the busy migrant relocations going on in the rest of the bloc. Both countries are still refusing to take part in the EU-mandated resettlement despite the fact that the European Commission has initiated an infringement procedure against Warsaw, Budapest and Prague for “non-compliance” with their legal obligations on relocation. Polish Minister of the Interior and Administration, Mariusz Blaszczak, informed Brussels that Poland has applied for cancellation of the infringement procedure.
Mr Blaszczak reiterated his country’s position when he said that “stating that the relocation system will heal the refugee problem is false, it’s a lie. EU policy is harmful, not to say suicidal, as regards open borders, ”adding that “Poland will not accept any refugees.” He also said that Poland did not agree that the Treaty grants the Commission rights to interfere in the national powers with regard to security, integration and social issues.
“Paris, Stockholm, Brussels, Berlin, Manchester, Barcelona. How many more European cities must be still attacked by terrorists to make European Union wake up? To make the European Commission finally admit that ‘blindly’ accepting everyone who reaches Europe’s coast is like looping a rope around Europe’s neck,” Mr. Blaszczak pointed out.
All four Visegrad countries – Hungary, Poland and the Czech and Slovak Republics – have joined their forces against the EU’s 2015 migrant resettlement program that sought to resettle 160,000 refugees across EU states. Slovakia’s Prime Minister, for example, proclaimed at the peak of the migrant crisis that there was “no place for Islam in Slovakia” and that the country would only accept Christian refugees.
Czech President Milos Zeman, in contrast, was among very few European leaders supporting Donald Trump in his run for US President and hailed his subsequent ban on refugees from the Muslim countries. Hungary’s Viktor Orban, another European Trump supporter, on his part, calls the refugee crisis an “invasion” and is in favor of keeping asylum-seekers in detention in metal shipping containers.
