Sir, – Your editorial "Hungary and migrants – Orbán's fence" (June 23rd), while providing accurate figures concerning the number of migrants to Hungary, unhelpfully goes on to make some unsubstantiated comments on Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán's policies.
I wish to call your attention to the fact that it was the Hungarian government that initiated a Europe-wide Roma strategy during its EU-presidency in the first half of 2011.
Mr Orbán is not alone in his “contempt for the idea of EU solidarity” (although “contempt for unbalanced/biased solidarity” would be more appropriate); in fact, quite a few leaders in the EU question the wisdom of introducing quotas in solving the immigration; among others, French president François Hollande has joined recently the V4 (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia) leaders in opposing the idea.
Reference to Mr Orbán’s alleged “war” with, among others, the European Commission over human rights also seems to me an insinuation lacking evidence, while his “sidling up” to Vladimir Putin is outright false. Hungary has adopted the EU sanctions against Russia, and is working closely with the fellow EU and Nato members in protecting Ukraine’s sovereignty.
The only area where Hungary actually has close ties with Russia is energy supply. On the one hand, it is a matter of necessity rather than by choice in the absence of alternative sources and, on the other, if it amounts to “sidling up” to the Kremlin, then it is not only Hungary within the EU that is “guilty” in this question – for the same reasons as Hungary.
Finally, I cannot agree more with the statement that “there is no solution without Europe-wide co-operation” in solving the immigration problem, and I am eagerly waiting for the appropriate EU authorities to come up with a thoughtful strategy that will work for each and every member of the community. – Yours, etc,
Dr TAMÁS MAGYARICS,
Ambassador of Hungary,
Fitzwilliam Place,
Dublin 2.