Hungary asks United Nations for global quota on migrants

Migrants are surrounded by Italian police officers on the rocks on the shoreline at the French-Italian border in Ventimiglia, Italy, on Wednesday.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who has criticised Hungary’s sealing of its borders, has called on Europeans to do more and has convened a meeting for today on the crisis.

In his address, Davutoglu said the United Nations had “failed” to save lives in Syria and stressed that Turkey had “assumed more than its fair share of the burden” from the refugee crisis.

Almost 300,000 migrants have entered Hungary this year. However, aid workers in the region point out the obvious – that airstrikes kill and displace more people.

The huge influx, Europe’s biggest since World War II, has exposed deep rifts in the continent about where the newcomers should go and what should be done to stem the flow.

“There are clear European regulations saying that member-states have to defend the external borders,” he said. Nineteen countries are donating US$1.8 billion to United Nations agencies with an emphasis on work to improve basic conditions in refugee camps.

“The cause of this tragedy is the fear of violence and terrorism, and terror of poverty”, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said in New York.

“This is not a refugee crisis or a migrant crisis, it’s a mass popular movement with an unlimited supply of people“, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto told reporters at the United Nations on the sidelines of the annual gathering of world leaders.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban says he is acting to save Europe’s “Christian values” by blocking the main overland route used by mainly Muslim refugees through the Balkans.

“All major stakeholders of worldwide politics will have to take a few of the migrants to their countries as part of a global quota system”, Mr. Orban said.

“Critics on Hungary are unfair and unjust”, Szijjarto said.

Also vital is protection; non-discrimination; preparedness to better adjudicate claims; responsibility sharing in terms of boosting the number of refugee resettlement places; better cooperation between countries of origin, transit and destination; managed migration to ensure safe and legal channels for refugees and migrants; anticipating future challenges – including the plight of those escaping areas progressively ravaged by climate change.