Closing the Libyan migration route is an increasingly important European interest

According the Prime Minster’s Chief Security Advisor, György Bakondi, Libya’s security and the closure of the Libyan migration route is increasingly becoming an outstanding European interest in view of the fact that huge numbers of people who are not political refugees have set out for Europe from Sub-Saharan Africa and many more are waiting in preparation.

Speaking on Hungarian M1 television’s Sunday afternoon current affairs program, Mr. Bakondi said: “Economic migrants are setting out for Europe in the hope of a better life, and believe that If they succeed in crossing the Mediterranean, ‘usually with the help of NGOs and people smugglers’, then they can settle in Europe, but the Hungarian Government does not agree”.

“This mass of people must be ‘intercepted’ in Libya, on the Mediterranean, or at Libya’s southern border”, he said, adding that this is why several countries, including Hungary, have already put forward proposals at European Union level for the establishment of a European army, in view of the fact that the security issues that need solving, such as peacekeeping and border closure, require military action, not police action.

Mr. Bakondi repeated the Government’s standpoint according to which the assessment of who is entitled to asylum status should be performed in so-called hotspots established outside the borders of the European Union, and only those should be allowed to enter the EU “who do not represent a danger to national security”. 

Distributed by APO on behalf of Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Hungary.