Hungary prepared to sue EU executive for border protection costs, minister says

BUDAPEST, Hungary -- Hungary is exploring legal avenues for forcing the European Union’s executive commission to reimburse it for funds it has spent on border protection, a minister said on Thursday, potentially deepening a conflict with the EU over Hungary's restrictive immigration and asylum policies.

The Hungarian government has instructed the country's Minister for European Affairs to negotiate with the European Commission to resolve the conflict, which has seen Hungary fined 200 million euros ($220 million) for breaking the bloc's rules on granting asylum, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s chief of staff, Gergely Gulyás, told a news conference.

“In recent years, Hungary has spent an amount equivalent to 2 billion euros on the protection of the external Schengen border without receiving any contribution from the European Union,” Gulyás said, referring to the 29-country Schengen zone in which people and goods can cross borders without document checks.

“We want to receive these costs from the Commission by legal means,” he continued, “so we are even prepared to sue the European Commission.”

Hungary's staunchly anti-immigration government has long been at odds with the EU over its restrictive policy on providing protection for refugees and asylum seekers. But the conflict ratcheted up in June when the European Court of Justice ordered Hungary to pay a fine of 200 million euros for persistently breaking the bloc’s asylum rules, and an additional 1 million euros per day until it brings policies into line with EU law. The government in Budapest is delaying payment.

In response to the fines, Orbán's nationalist government threatened to provide immigrants with free bus transport from Hungary’s southern border to the EU's headquarters in Brussels, something the bloc's powerful commission vowed on Tuesday would prompt retaliation from the EU.

On Thursday, Gulyás clarified that only individuals who had received political asylum from Hungary would be eligible for the free travel to Belgium's capital.

“Illegal immigrants will not enter Europe through Hungary and through the southern border of Schengen. Those who receive political asylum under the legal procedure in accordance with EU rules, and on the basis of their voluntary decision, are offered a one-way, free trip to Brussels,” he said.

Gulyás also lashed out at a recent decision by Germany to institute border checks along all of its nine frontiers in order to crack down on irregular migration, a decision that has called into question the durability of the Schengen zone and threatened to upend European unity.

“Migration will tear Schengen apart. Germany is the one that is tearing Schengen apart,” Gulyás said.

Hungary has until Sept. 17 to submit payment of the fines imposed by the EU's top court.