Migrants' Return From Austria to Hungary to Top Bilateral Talks Agenda - Vienna

The process of returning migrants from Austria to Hungary is set to be on top of the agenda at the negotiations between Vienna and Budapest on the level of defense and interior ministers in the coming month, spokesman for the Austrian Interior Ministry Karl-Heinz Grundboeck told Sputnik on Tuesday.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — In the first days of September the officials of both countries are due to meet for a new round of discussion to decide on the fate of approximately 5,000 migrants that have entered Austria from the Hungarian territory, and, as Vienna maintains, should now be taken back by Budapest.

"We are holding a discussion about return [of migrants] from Austria to Hungary, it will be the main issue… Under the Dublin agreement we do have a number of cases for return from Austria to Hungary but for the time being there are certain challenges regarding this return," Grundboeck said.

In June, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said upon meeting with his Austrian counterpart Christian Kern that his country would would only take back those migrants who first entered the European Union by registering in Hungary. Migrants who first arrived in other EU states, such as Greece, would be rejected, he warned. On Monday, the office of the Hungarian prime minister reiterated its stance, telling Sputnik that Budapest would only accept those who entered EU territories in Hungary first.

Grundboeck reminded that according to a judgment by the European Court of Human Rights, there is no return of migrants to Greece because of the poor accommodation conditions there.

The stress was great on Greece which is one of the main points of entry for migrants in Europe. Under the Dublin Regulation, the first EU country of entry should take responsibility for asylum applications. However, almost all EU countries stopped returning asylum seekers to Greece under the Dublin rules after a 2011 ruling by the European Court of Human Rights that found conditions in Greece inhuman and degrading.