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Hungary offers bus ride to refugees heading for Austrian border

Xinhua, September 5, 2015 Adjust font size:

Hungarian government has offered to pick up refugees and take them by bus to the border with Austria, the prime minister's office announced at an unscheduled news conference on Friday evening, according to local wire service MTI.

Janos Lazar, the minister in charge of the prime minister's office, said the government's Central Operative Corps would send buses overnight to the Eastern (Keleti) Railway Station and to the refugees walking along the M1 motorway towards Vienna, and would offer to take them to the border crossing.

The corps is meeting overnight to discuss how to remedy the chaotic situation with hundreds of refugees walking along the motorway to Vienna and hundreds more camped out at the railway station, demanding to be allowed to travel to Germany.

Lazar said it was vital to prevent Hungary's transportation systems from becoming paralyzed in the next 24 hours, and the halting of international trains and restrictions on motorway vehicle traffic to keep the refugees safe was drastically slowing traffic.

Lazar said the migrants would be asked to accept the government's assistance to stay safe. He said that about 100 buses would be made available.

He continued that travel to the border was not tantamount to travel to Austria since Vienna would have to agree to allow them in. Hungary, he said, would continue to try to register the refugees, but underlined that no one could be forced to be registered against their will.

Lazar said he was waiting for the Austrian government to specify entry and exit conditions. He said the Austrian government had already told that about 1,200 refugees were heading towards the Austrian border.

Hungary, he said, has done its best to adhere to European Union (EU) rules governing people coming from outside the EU, and while many EU countries have been citing the need for solidarity, so far no one has been ready to give Hungary a hand in solidarity.

So, Lazar said, Hungary can no longer wait for the EU, or for Germany or for Austria.

National police chief Karoly Papp upped the estimate of the number of refugees walking on the motorway to 1,200, adding that another 300 people were walking on the tracks of the main rail line to Vienna, which meant having to halt all trains. Enditem