Migrants at Hungary border become part of election campaign
MAJDAN, Serbia (AP) — A group of migrants huddles beside a small, smoky fire inside an abandoned building in northern Serbia, the last moments of warmth before they set out into the driving snow toward the razor wire, cameras and sensors of Hungary's electrified border fence.
A few hours later, they return, their efforts to cross through Hungary and toward Western Europe thwarted by the three-meter (10-foot) fence and heavy Hungarian police patrols which, after intercepting them, escorted them back across the border into Serbia.
“I’m going to Austria, I’m going to Germany, I’m going to the Netherlands," says Muhtar Ahmad, a 26-year-old from Aleppo, Syria, who is squatting with around 35 other migrants in the makeshift camp outside the Serbian village of Majdan, a mile (less than two kilometers) from the Hungarian border.
“I’m not staying in Hungary. What’s the problem?”
As migrants from Syria, Afghanistan and other countries embark on the last stretch of their long journeys toward Europe's wealthier nations, their efforts to cross irregularly into the European Union through Hungary — and the country's contentious practice of returning them to Serbia when they are caught — have made them part of a political campaign with which Hungary's nationalist leader hopes to win an upcoming general election.
Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who polls suggest will face his closest election in more than a decade in April, is campaigning on a strict anti-immigration platform and is keen to use the prospect of a wave of migrants amassing at Hungary's border as a means to mobilize his conservative voter base.
“Just this year we stopped and detained ... more than 100,000 people,” Orban claimed at a rare appearance before journalists in December. "If the Hungarian fence had not stood...
