Vladimir Putin's responsibility for this war is crystal clear, the head of state said.Continue reading
As the winter season approaches and Ukrainian infrastructure comes under increasing attack, more and more people may leave Ukraine to survive in another country. European countries are taking in many Ukrainian refugees, but the finger-pointing has already begun in the West about who is taking in how many.
Hungary’s Világgazdaság, a news site, quotes an article in Romania’s HotNews.ro that some EU countries are more willing to accept refugees and are more involved than others. According to the official data of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), around 7.9 million Ukrainians fled their country so far.
Poland has so far taken in the most refugees, with 1.5 million, while 463,000 Ukrainians have sought asylum in the Czech Republic. Germany also has a high number of Ukrainian refugees, around one million. However, the picture in some western and southern EU countries is already different, with Germany’s Bild reporting that France, Italy and Spain have taken in far fewer refugees so far. The UNHCR counts a total of 446,000 Ukrainian refugees in the three countries, fewer than the Czechs alone.
It was not long before the European Union was once again using the term solidarity, which is now used not only for illegal migrants but also for Ukrainian refugees. In a statement to Bild am Sonntag, German MEP Manfred Weber said that if more Ukrainians are forced to flee over the winter, Western Europe will have to take more responsibility.
All EU countries must bear this unprecedented challenge in solidarity,”
the politician for the Christian Social Union in Bavaria said. This call for solidarity is also shown bluntly in the fact that the European Union wants to help Ukraine with another joint borrowing thus placing itself into debt for years.
While Hungary rejects the idea of the joint borrowing, it wants to help Ukraine, and thus the government has already earmarked the country’s share of this sum within the budget, and will be giving this money to the Ukrainians, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated recently.
At the same time, Hungary is also doing well receiving those fleeing war-torn Ukraine, one obvious reason being that it is a neighbor of Ukraine. Since the outbreak of the war, more than one million people have arrived in Hungary, but most Ukrainians have only stayed for a short time, leaving for other European countries after a few days. During their few days here, however, they receive all the help they need from the Hungarian authorities and civilian helpers to make their journey smooth.
According to the official figures presented by Bild, the number of Ukrainians registered in Hungary is 32,271, but it is important to note that official figures can often differ from the real ones.
Meanwhile, the number of people entering Hungary is not decreasing, and Hungarian police continue to report that thousands of Ukrainians are crossing the border from Ukraine or Romania every day. According to the police’s official data, during the weekend, almost 20,000 Ukrainians entered Hungary.
This is also costing the Hungarian state considerable amounts of money. Hungarian Finance Minister Mihály Varga said recently that Hungary has spent 31 billion forints (EUR 76 million) so far to support Ukraine. Moreover, Hungary is also carrying out its largest humanitarian operation to date in Ukraine.
Featured photo via police.hu
