Migrants Denied Access To Budapest Keleti Train Station

  • 2 Sep 2015 9:00 AM
Migrants Denied Access To Budapest Keleti Train Station
Police blocked access to Keleti train station on Tuesday in a complete reversal of Monday’s scenes in which trains overloaded with refugees were permitted to leave for Austria. The station was closed to all passengers until after 10 a.m., when police allowed ticket-holders to enter the station through a side door, reportedly based on whether they looked like refugees. Refugees who had valid tickets were once again not allowed to board trains.

State railway company MÁV said in the afternoon that train traffic had resumed, but the authorities were allowing only those with adequate passports and if necessary visas to board trains to Western Europe.

Police press officer Andrea Dudás-Kanyog told Magyar Idõk that they had no information about why the policy regarding migrants travel had changed from Monday.

Meanwhile, refugees demonstrated in large numbers outside the station as numerous foreign TV crews and journalists recorded the scene.

Many repeatedly shouted “Hungary no! Germany yes!” and praised German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Some pleaded for assistance from the EU, while others waved a drawing of a train above the caption “Germany”.

Many refugees began a sit-down strike outside the entrance to the station Tuesday evening following the long demonstrations involving hundreds of people earlier in the day.

By evening the situation remained tense, as hundreds of men demanded in English and Arabic that they be allowed to move on to Germany.

Most migrants now say they are Syrians, Magyar Hírlap writes, as they have heard that some EU countries, including Germany, are accepting arrivals from Syria as war refugees.

Source: Hungary Around the Clock

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MTI photo: Koszticsák Szilárd

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