- Title: EUROPE-MIGRANTS/HUNGARY Hungarians rally against fence to keep out migrants
- Date: 14th July 2015
- Summary: BUDAPEST, HUNGARY (JULY 14, 2015) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF PROTESTERS MARCHING, SOME HOLDING BANNERS AND PLACARDS BANNER SAYING 'MIGRANTS ARE FOR HUNGARY' (SOUNDBITE) (Hungarian) DEMONSTRATOR, AGNES HARS, SAYING: "The government has been making steps that were not thought through, like building a wall where there should not be one, where we should help instead building walls a
- Embargoed: 29th July 2015 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Hungary
- Country: Hungary
- Topics: General
- Reuters ID: LVA2DGO0NUDT2O80AZXZAONUA1IN
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: A thousand people demonstrated in downtown Budapest on Tuesday (July 14) against a fence Hungary is building along its border with Serbia to keep out an accelerating flow of migrants entering from the south.
The rally, organized by civic groups, started from the city's biggest church, Saint Stephen's Basilica, under banners "Jesus was a migrant, too" and "My best friend is a migrant".
The marchers walked to the neo-gothic Parliament building, where they demolished a 15-metre (16.4 yards) mock fence symbolizing the one being put up along the border, cutting the wire into pieces.
The fence that Hungary started to construct on Monday (July 13) will be four metres high and 175 kilometres (108.74 miles) long. The government says it is defending the European Union's and its own borders, after registering more than 70,000 migrants so far this year, up from 43,000 all last year.
Speakers at the rally said the fence would not keep people from fleeing war zones and the money spent on it was a waste. One of them said the fence was "immoral", after hundreds of thousands has moved into Western states from Eastern Europe for a better living.
"The government has been making steps that were not thought through, like building a wall where there should not be one, where we should help instead building walls and all that money should be spent on aid," said Agnes Hars, a demonstrator.
"I think every European nation has the responsibility to do all they can to alleviate the suffering of others which is especially caused by our own policies abroad and in the Middle East," said Johann Mahr, a student from Germany.
"These people are not economic migrants as the government says... most of them are literally fleeing from situations that are absolutely horrible," he added.
Hungary started building a fence on Monday along its border with Serbia to try to stop illegal migrants entering from the south, a barrier which German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said makes "no sense".
Tens of thousands of migrants, mainly from the Middle East and Africa, use the Balkans route to get into the European Union, passing from Greece to Macedonia and Serbia and then to the EU's visa-free Schengen zone that starts in Hungary.
Most migrants travel on to wealthier parts of the EU, but Hungary's government has said those states might send illegal migrants back to Hungary. It blocked just such a move last month, provoking tensions with Vienna.
Although the EU's rules allow countries to send migrants back to their first point of entry into the bloc, there is no evidence of a large scale of such returns to Hungary yet.
Shelters in Hungary and Austria are overcrowded and late last month Hungarian police used tear gas to subdue hundreds of migrants fighting each other and throwing rocks in a camp in the eastern city Debrecen.
"This is 'trial fence' which has an important message for the public and the press. The Hungarian Military has begun building all the logistical systems that they will use to build the final fence. For the time being there are co-ordinations taking place with the town and surrounding settlements along the border," said the Mayor of Morahalom, Zoltan Nogradi.
Locals were sceptical about whether the fence is the right strategy to deal with the situation.
"I think the fence is a stupid idea. If the migrants want to come through they will. It cannot be stopped like this. It should be to look at why they are leaving and giving them help right there where they are coming from," one resident said.
The United Nations and the Council of Europe have criticized changes to Hungary's asylum laws, saying they would harm asylum-seekers' right to seek safety there and put them at risk. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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