Viktor Orbán: “Hungary is Capable of Defending the Interior of Europe”

Last Friday (December 15), the heads of state and government convened for a summit under the aegis of the European Council. One of the main topics was the ongoing migration crisis, in which the Visegrad Four countries (Poland, Czechia, Slovakia, and Hungary) have emerged as an opposition force against policies imposed by Brussels.

After the summit Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán spoke to the press. Below are relevant excerpts from his remarks.

Donald Trump recently talked about the idea of “safe spaces” in Syria that could be set up so that would-be migrants would not have to leave the country. Mr. Orbán’s idea of locating migrant centers in North Africa — where asylum seekers could await an EU decision on their cases — reminds me of Mr. Trump’s proposal.

Mr. Orbán emphasized repeatedly that the Balkan Route has now been closed to migrants, and that the only way they can get into Europe is through Italy. He also stressed that regardless of what other countries do, Hungary and its allies in the V4, plus Austria, are capable of keeping migrants from traveling to the interior of Europe via the Balkans.

Many thanks to CrossWare for the translation, and to Vlad Tepes for the subtitling:

Transcript:

00:00   There were a large number of topics on the agenda
00:04   at yesterday’s meeting of the European Council.
00:08   It is hard to organize it properly. Let’s use some Hungarian logic,
00:12   let’s talk about in order of what most important for us.
00:16   The most important from Hungarian point of view
00:20   is that before the summit the Visegrad Four met,
00:24   and the Prime Ministers are had a discussion,
00:28   where we accepted a joint statement.
00:32   We made that public, I believe.
00:36   I implore you to study it, as it contains everything
00:40   one should know about migration
00:44   in Europe today.
00:48   Let’s state three things very quickly,
00:52   there is nothing new about it, but because of the pressure on us,
00:56   we must repeat it: these three statements are self-evident.
01:00   This is a very important political result:
01:04   We must defend our borders, those who came in must be returned,
01:08   and anybody who wants to come in or must be returned, we should keep
01:12   in large camps outside of the European Union,
01:16   and separate them there, so the member states of the EU
01:20   can decide, each one individually, who they wish to allow
01:24   to enter to their sovereign territory.
01:28   This is the triad, the three pillars, on which the V4’s position stands.
01:32   Naturally we are paying attention to humanitarian questions,
01:36   to international law, as you should know very well.
01:40   So for the solution, everything stands or falls,
01:44   on whether we close the borders or not.
01:48   I just want to say that Hungary, from the direction of the Balkans towards the interior
01:52   of Europe, successfully closed it. Greece can’t close its borders;
01:56   the fate of the Greeks depends on the Turks’ goodwill.
02:00   And Italy also can’t or won’t close its borders.
02:04   From a European point of view the situation in Italy is dramatic.
02:08   This was not denied by the new Prime Minister.
02:12   Up until now Italy was mostly a transit country,
02:16   and now, as the proportions of Africans increased
02:20   in between the arriving migrant groups,
02:24   Italy more and more become a target country; the situation
02:28   — based on the presentation by the [Italian] Prime Minister — become increasingly difficult.
02:32   Well, ladies and gentlemen, the V4 established their united view,
02:36   The interior of Europe cannot be reached
02:40   using the Balkan route, but only from Italy,
02:44   by the migrants.
02:48   In the debate, which was about this issue, I said
02:52   the Slovakian president did an excellent job,
02:56   There was a serious will to look for compromises.
03:00   It was not their fault that they could not find any.
03:04   It was not their fault, but the result of
03:08   simple fact that we have two very different
03:12   packages on the table, which are not possible to combine.
03:16   Which are so different, that compromise is simply not possible. That is the truth!
03:20   The closing document encourages us to continue to discuss issues,
03:24   and of course we will continue to negotiate because it is better than not to negotiate,
03:28   and looking for a compromise is better than not looking for one, but we must be aware
03:32   that two mutually exclusive views are on the table. Put it another way: what the Germans want,
03:35   the Hungarians do not. Or to phrase it completely precisely: we don’t know what the Germans want —
03:40   we know what the German Chancellor wants.
03:44   What the German Chancellor wants, the Hungarians do not want.
03:48   We know what Hungarians want, because we are the only country that asked its people what they want.
03:52   So here it’s not a government opinion that stands against
03:56   another government stance, but it is the German government position
04:00   against the interests of the Hungarian people
04:04   and their expressed wishes and position. So
04:08   the search for compromises is important, but either we distribute [the migrants] or not.
04:12   So the Germans want distribution, while we say
04:16   that only we can decide who stays in Hungary. The gap
04:20   between viewpoints will be impossible to bridge.
04:24   The other thing I could say
04:28   about his agenda item,
04:32   is to say thanks. We thanked
04:36   the other three countries of the V4 for their continuous support,
04:40   as they have been sending military and law enforcement help.
04:44   We thanked Austria, which lately joined the efforts of the V4
04:48   to protect the Hungarian borders with significant forces.
04:52   We openly thanked
04:56   Chancellor [Christian] Kern for this effort.
05:00   It shows that in national security, other issues for the Austrians are
05:04   secondary, because the Chancellor represents the Socialist Party.
05:08   This can’t be said about us! [Socialists want migrants in Hungary — translator]
05:12   We brought up this agenda item
05:16   concerning the Balkan route, no reason to be afraid,
05:20   because there is fear present, as the situation for the Turks is fragile.
05:24   Independently of President Erdogan’s position, still fragile,
05:28   we can see that terrorist acts are committed in Turkey,
05:32   the life of the President and his family depended on 20 minutes,
05:36   in the last coup attempt, so independent of all this,
05:40   whatever President Erdogan wants, the position of Turkey is uncertain.
05:44   So it is right to ask the question,
05:48   will another flood of migrants will from the south begin,
05:52   from the direction of Turkey?
05:56   Our answer is: this is possible, but do not panic, the Hungarian border defense
06:00   is reinforced at this moment with new technical solutions,
06:04   and Hungary is capable of defending the interior of Europe.
06:08   So it is possible there will be movement on the Balkan route.
06:12   The prime ministers, including myself, agreed
06:16   we will help each other in situations like this, but even if
06:20   cooperation were to fail to stop the migration as far south as possible,
06:24   in the latest migration wave,
06:28   Hungary by itself would be capable — with V4 and Austrian help — for certain,
06:32   Of stopping any movement at its borders,
06:36   no matter the size,
06:40   to stop any migration flood. I said this at the summit;
06:44   they can count on us in Brussels,
06:48   also in Vienna and Berlin, too.
06:52   I told them they could help us,
06:56   but so far there is no sign of that, with the exception of the V4
07:00   and the Austrians. Horribile dictu, even Brussels could help us,
07:04   for now they are just making our job much harder.
07:08   If unrealistic laws they made could be repealed, as I asked,
07:12   to change those rules, which make it possible that
07:16   migrants which enter who were refused on lawful grounds,
07:20   are using appeals as made available in any lawful society.
07:24   So they turn to the courts,
07:28   And while the legal proceedings are ongoing,
07:32   they can step into Hungarian territory and freely move there.
07:35   Let’s not hide this: all of them, if they can,
07:38   want to leave the country in a westerly direction. If the EU were to make it possible,
07:44   if it would no longer forbid us,
07:48   those whose application was refused, but choose to appeal,
07:52   could remain in custody,
07:56   and nobody could leave Hungary to continue in a westerly direction.
08:00   But my request was not accepted yesterday by the
08:04   Council of the Prime Ministers, so I must say,
08:08   between the protectors of the status quo and the reform opposition,
08:12   the power relationship does not look good,
08:16   as we count ourselves in the reform opposition, here in Brussels,
08:20   in simple issues like this — which serve the interests of others, not us —
08:24   we could not show positive results.
08:28   So until judgment is rendered, the migrants can move
08:32   freely on Hungarian territory, the responsibility rests on
08:36   Brussels, and also it is their fault if the migrants depart towards the west.
08:40   Respected ladies and gentlemen,
08:44   I consider it an important achievement that the prime ministers
08:48   agreed on the need to conclude agreements with African countries,
08:52   the same type of agreements that we made
08:56   with Turkey.
09:00   We created different country groups.
09:04   I suggested that Egypt should be included in the list of countries,
09:08   with which we will conclude an agreement. Egypt is a key question.
09:12   We do not have as good a position as some other countries.
09:16   We can state that where we could make such agreements,
09:20   we succeeded in creating good cooperation; we have multiple examples,
09:24   we made significant advances in decreasing the number of migrants from those places.
09:28   I would like to signal, that those thoughts of ours,
09:32   which were qualified as inhumane, impossible and crazy,
09:36   as presented by the international media, and some prime ministers, too
09:40   — when I made my suggestion in that
09:44   Schengen 2.0 package — you may recall that
09:48   as international politics is changing so fast,
09:52   it seems like it was years ago, but really just a couple months in the past.
09:56   That time I received hot and cold,
10:00   mostly cold for it. I said we need a large refugee camp,
10:04   with EU protection to build and operate it,
10:08   somewhere on the coast of Libya,
10:12   or somewhere else in Africa on the Mediterranean coastline.
10:16   Now this viewpoint has won its rightful place.
10:20   Now we talk about how we can do it in practice,
10:24   about who we should talk to make an agreement with, and where it should be.
10:28   This is shows that even in Brussels not all hope is lost.
10:32   Maybe it’s worth making suggestions, which even refused at first, are later
10:36   accepted with a momentary presence of wisdom.
10:40   Respected ladies and gentlemen,
10:44   Other than this we talked about security questions,
10:48   if you let me…
10:52   then we had the Secretary General of NATO as our guest,
10:56   We had him as our guest
11:00   to talk about cooperation on European security.
11:04   He came with the intention, and that is why we invited him,
11:08   to figure out not to have any overlap between the NATO and the future EU defense organization,
11:12   and to make sure that this new defense would not look like something set up against NATO,
11:16   or that would look like a replacement.
11:20   It is correct that we keep this interpretation.
11:24   This correlates with Hungarian interests, and NATO has its own role.
11:28   But at the same time we connect
11:32   this will to establish a European defense
11:36   to what we see in the Syrian situation.
11:40   We exchanged a lot of ideas and opinions about that yesterday.
11:44   It is obvious we have a lot to do in this area.
11:48   The most important thing is to face reality.
11:52   I can’t say that happened yesterday evening,
11:56   but we moved in that direction.
12:00   In the case of Syria,
12:04   not just forceful, but looking at international measures,
12:08   definitely rough statements were made,
12:12   as my PM colleagues made some after the summit.
12:16   In the common declaration you can find some strong statements,
12:20   but we must face reality.
12:24   We can see we have a good heart, a strong voice,
12:28   but we have no strength.
12:32   And this is what is reflecting back, the combination of these three things,
12:36   the feeling of helplessness radiates back from all these statements.
12:40   The moral of Syria — where some Western states were present
12:44   with military force in the events —
12:48   Is that if we do not have military strength, that can only end with military loss.
12:52   At this moment this is what we suffer in Syria.
12:56   And if we have military defeat, we say
13:00   we have instead a military victory and bring real help to the people there;
13:04   we have only a tirade of rhetoric about good intentions.
13:08   Expressing goodwill I believe is important,
13:12   It is important for us too, because this is about self-respect,
13:16   and it is important for the Syrians, who even we can’t help with military power,
13:20   with the tools of diplomacy and international law, we are on their side.
13:24   But well-intentioned rhetoric can’t solve the military situation
13:28   which is now being solved by the military power of others in Syria.
13:32   And if we talk about facing reality,
13:36   we can immediately connect the Ukraine here.
13:40   How could the EU without a common military power
13:44   — I do not use the word “army”, because yesterday meeting of prime ministers avoided that —
13:48   So how could we want
13:52   to use military force
13:56   far from European territory, as we do not have a common military force,
14:00   while we are not even able to assert any influence in the Ukraine,
14:04   Or have an effect on the military events in the region.
14:08   It’s not just military events we could not do — the Ukraine was a long item in the agenda —
14:12   but we are not able to do such things — which are not military, but political questions —
14:16   to give such things to the Ukrainians, which do not require any kind of military policy,
14:20   where we do not have any legal obstruction,
14:24   where nobody wants or does anything against it,
14:28   and that is to give visas to them immediately.
14:32   We are not even giving them that. Instead we spent long hours arguing,
14:36   about the agreement that got torpedoed by the Dutch,
14:40   and the almost completely derailed Free Trade Agreement —
14:44   how to bring back them to the land of the living.
14:48   That happened yesterday, so the resuscitation was successful.
14:52   This is a serious result, but in the meantime we should not forget,
14:56   from the horizon, the fact, ongoing for months,
15:00   that we are unable — now that all the legal obstructions are eliminated — we are unable
15:04   to give visa-free travel to Ukraine. If we can’t give them this,
15:08   then what are we really doing for Ukraine?
15:12   In the case of Ukraine we had a huge argument. I have to say the opinions of the
15:16   V4 were pronounced and determined.
15:20   The V4 point of view is strongly on the side of Ukraine,
15:24   independently what anybody thinks about
15:28   the reasonable and correct policies towards Russia,
15:32   from this all four of us independently represented
15:36   strong supporting points of view by all the members of the V4.
15:40   This is good for the future. Let’s not forget that from July 2017,
15:44   Hungary will be taking on the coordination of the work of the V4,
15:48   and obviously helping Ukraine. As co-ordination with EU was unsuccessful,
15:52   at least in the framework of the V4 we will do more,
15:56   and we will do that for sure.
 

21 thoughts on “Viktor Orbán: “Hungary is Capable of Defending the Interior of Europe”

  1. it is not a migration crisis, it is a colonization crisis. migration is when someone moves from one place in a country to another place in the same country. isn’t it funny how the entire worldwide media misuse the same word at the same time. please don’t let the left capture the language. you are living in a new colonial period in history. what is different about this colonial era from past colonial eras is in the past politicians sent their citizens to another country to colonize it. in this colonial era the leftist politicians are bring people from other countries to colonize your country. the purpose of colonization is to conquer the colonized country. that is what your leftist politicians are doing, using the colonists to conquer you. you will be living in a totalitarian country if you don’t stop the colonization.

    • Migrants are a proxy militia deployed by Western politicians against their own citizens. It is a war without a cause, undeclared and even denied. Above all it has no purpose except to destroy white, Christian people.

  2. Orban brings out an interesting point: the EU is totally uncooperative when it comes to taking actions to defend European borders, or to aid the Ukrainians by giving them visa-free travel within the EU. I myself think Orban is trying to buy trouble he doesn’t need by sticking his nose in the Ukraine – Crimea affair, and giving Ukrainians, who are as gangster-prone as any European country, free access to EU countries.

    From Orban’s own mouth, the EU opposes any actions which benefit Europeans, including the Ukrainians, and continues enforcing rules and regulations facilitating the movement of African peoples into Europe.

    My view is that the EU bureaucracy, and the Merkel government anticipated the election of a Hilary Presidency, and were therefore planning to engineer an incident with the refugees on the Hungarian border. The incident would be used as a pretext to send NATO troops to “protect” the refugees by taking over control of the border. Having pushed the Hungarian troops aside, the NATO troops would then allow free access for migrants into Hungary. Any resistance by Hungary would be met by the same tactics used in Serbia by NATO.

    The election of Trump ended the possibility of the use of force on Hungary. The EU military is too weak, and Trump would likely immediately halt the use of US forces in any intra-European dispute as soon as he took office.

    Of course the question remains of why the EU bureaucrats would connive towards the destruction of Europe. The response is, it doesn’t matter why. The directions and approximate tactics of the EU can be accurately described. Their motivations cannot, but the knowledge of their motivations does not detract from the predictability of their actions.

    • I continue to wonder why Orban would want an EU army.
      It seems to me that this army would be deployed against Hungary as its first mission.
      IMO, the V4 plus Austria would be better served by coordinating their military and leaving the EU out of it.
      I foresee an EU army sending troops from say Belgium into Hungary. They wouldn’t care who they killed.

      • Another theory from me:
        I think Orbán clearly remembers how the NATO was used against Serbia, helping Muslims. The NATO is outdated, made for a past world of the cold war and it is hijacked by the Globalists. Also I think when Orbán talks about Europe, he mostly mean post EU alliance where V4 is the central core, where Germany and France either in civil war or significantly weaker because of its islamization processes. He wants the V4 countries (plus anyone else who joins) to defend against an Islamic Germany and France. Obviously he do not want to rely on Russians only (maybe some alliance). The Russian bear would reach out, but everybody in the region knows how it is when a bear give you a hug!

      • I totally agree with everything you said. And EU army would be an existential threat to Hungary and the V4.

        One thought is that Orban is a master strategist and uses the absence of a functioning EU army as a sticking point he can use to prick their dignity bubble. He doesn’t actually want an EU army, but uses its absence to emphasize their impotence and incompetence. A general knows he can’t get too far in front of his army, and Hungary might not be ready to totally renounce the EU and any involvement in it. The objective is to keep Hungary out of the EU’s focus while it undergoes its dangerous death-throes.

    • Hi RonaldB,
      An excellent analysis!

      I have a theory why Orban is insists on “helping Ukrainians”. (I might be wrong of course, this is just a guess)
      One of the major reason the western countries justified their import of goat herders, because the acute need for workers. (like an illiterate jihadist will put together Mercedes cars). Nevertheless that was and still is the main justification for mass import. If Ukraine would get their visa, a large quantity highly trained white Christian workforce could step into the market, taking out one of the major reasoning of the EU elite.

      • “We need more workers” was a feeble excuse which, like all the others, never stood up to the slightest scrutiny. If it was true, Germany could have imported some of the thousands of well-trained but unemployed Spaniards & Greeks. No, Orban probably values Ukrainians for their fighting spirit, a quality badly needed but sadly lacking among European men.

    • Hungary, unlike Serbia, is a member of NATO, so the arrangements for authorising the use of force are not comparable.

      • Well I have seen a lot of articles written by Soros shills quoting Hungarian liberals and socialists (also in Soros pay), how the “fascist dictator” Orban government is hijacked democracy (that is why he insisted on the referendum to prove it otherwise) and demanded intervention to “save democracy”. This was very consistent until Trump won. I believe that was a mental preparation for military action.

  3. “Italy also can’t or won’t close its borders” – Orban.
    Federica Mogherini of the EU, a Communist, is insisting on helping the people-traffickers with “Search and Rescue”, a hideously Orwellian misdescription. She is abetted in this by Ban Ki Moon, and the bullying Peter Sutherland of the UN. Sutherland is tainted by his paid position as Migration-Promoter in his “Global Forum of Migration and Development”, another hideously Orwellian title pre-deciding what is, in fact, a very dubious linkage.

    The Population Replacement strategy for destroying white Christian Europe is proceeding apace under these carefully misnamed banners.

    Slowly the indigenous Europeans are waking up. Thanks are due to Orban and the Visegrad Four. No thanks to the tainted mainstream media who keep blackening their motives while whitewashing Islam’s doctrine of eternal hostility.

  4. Please can we lose the “White Christian” theme? “Yellow” atheist (?) immigrants from China are not a threat, nor Jews from anywhere (though sadly some are leaving), nor even “brown” non-muslims from the Subcontinent.; most of the above are hard-working, value education and don’t cause friction with the native population.

    • Sure non-whites are generally fine, but europe IS white and preserving that status is not racist or any other negative adjective but satisfies the no less than the UN charter on preserving indigenous peoples, of which white europeans is one such group.

      be careful about making assumptions that all people & cultures are equal, they are not.

      Lots of Sudanese blacks are committing crimes against the populace in Melbourne on a scale & nature unheard of prior to their arrival. The left wing local govt (who else?) sends the parents of Sudanese teenagers a list of their ‘rights’ upon which the teens leave their parents for the gang.

      We have never had problems from previous migrants groups other than muslims groups. Their ‘true’ nature is laid bare for all to see, tho the lefties continue to deflect & blame everyone other than the offenders.

  5. Thank you, Gates of Vienna, for taking the time and effort to bring us your translations.

    Prime Minister Orban resisted the bullying of Germany, Brussels, and the braying from the USA, which took strength and fortitude.

    I think that a “good heart” and “strong voice” will see us through.

  6. “Good heart” and “strong voice” may need to be joined by “straight-shooting rifles”.

    Just a guess…

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