Support for the EU’s plan to combat illegal migration is crumbling as yet another country is seeking an opt-out from the bloc’s rules on asylum.
The Netherlands recently sent shockwaves through the European Union after requesting to opt out of the bloc’s fundamental migration rules.
At the time Dutch migration minister Marjolein Faber wrote to the European Commission to say the Netherlands wanted to opt out of regulations for accepting refugees.
He added: “We have to handle our own asylum policy once more!”
And now an EU civil war looks likely as the European Union battles against Hungary pulling off a similar move amid concerns in Brussels that the Dutch request could be the start of a domino effect.
Budapest wrote to the EU’s home affairs commissioner Ylva Johansson on Monday requesting an exemption from the rules, Hungary’s minister for European Union affairs, Janos Boka, said on Facebook.
In the Facebook post, Boka said: “The Hungarian government is determined to take firm measures to protect its borders and curb illegal migration which threatens national security.”
He added “restoring stronger national control over migration” was “the only option” to curb “illegal migration”.
Hungary frequently accuses the European Commission of fuelling migration with its policies.
In June, the EU’s top court ordered Hungary to pay £168 million (€200 million) for persistently depriving migrants of their right to apply for asylum. The court imposed an additional fine of €1 million euros for every day it failed to comply.
The European Court of Justice described Hungary’s actions as “an unprecedented and extremely serious infringement of EU law”. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán slammed its ruling as “outrageous and unacceptable”.
The EU’s executive branch, the European Commission, said that given Hungary’s failure to pay or provide information about its intentions, Brussels is “moving to what we call the off-setting procedure” by taking the money from common funds that would otherwise go to Budapest.
