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| Refugees flash victory signs and wipe away tears as they arrive at the main train station in Munich, Germany, Saturday, Sept. 5, 2015. Hundreds of refugees arrived in various trains to get first registration as asylum seekers in Germany. |
BUDAPEST, Hungary
(AP) -- For weeks while they traveled a punitive road, Europe cast a
cold and callous eye on their unwelcome progress. On Saturday, for the
first time since fleeing their troubled homelands, they could set foot
in their promised land - and it came with a German face so friendly that
it brought some newcomers to tears of joy.
More
than 7,000 Arab and Asian asylum seekers surged across Hungary's
western border into Austria and Germany following the latest in a string
of erratic policy U-turns by Hungary's immigrant-loathing government.
Within hours, travelers predominantly from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan
who had been told for days they could not leave Hungary were scooped
from roadsides and Budapest's central train station and placed on
overnight buses, driven to the frontier with Austria and allowed to walk
across as a new morning dawned.
They were met
with wholly unexpected hospitality featuring free high-speed trains,
seemingly bottomless boxes of supplies, and gauntlets of well-wishers
offering trays of candy for everyone and cuddly toys for the tots in
mothers' arms. Even adults absorbed the scenes of sudden welcome with a
look of childlike wonderment as Germans and Austrians made clear that
they had reached a land that just might become a home.
"I'm
very glad to be in Germany. I hope that I find here a much better life.
I want to work," said Homam Shehade, a 37-year-old Syrian shopkeeper
who spent 25 days on the road. He left behind his parents, a brother,
wife, a 7-year-old boy and a 2 1/2-year-old girl. He hopes to bring
them all to Germany. Until then, he said: "I hope that God protects them
from the planes and bombs. My shop was bombed and my house was bombed."
As
the migrants departed Hungary, leaders took a few final swipes at their
departing guests and those considered foolish enough to host them.
Prime
Minister Viktor Orban told reporters that Hungary collected and drove
the migrants to the border only because they were posing a public
menace, particularly by snarling traffic and rail lines west of Budapest
when they mounted a series of surprise breakouts from police-controlled
positions Friday and headed for Austria in large groups on foot.
Orban
said the people being taken by Germany mostly come "from regions that
are not ravaged by war.
They just want to live the kind of life that we
have. And I understand that, but this is impossible. If we let everybody
in, it's going to destroy Europe."
Orban said
Hungary was determined to staunch the flow of foreigners traversing the
country. He criticized European Union plans to reach a bloc-wide
agreement at a summit Sept. 14 committing each nation to accept higher
quotas of foreigners to shelter, arguing that this would only spur more
one-way traffic.
"What will it solve if we divide 50,000 or 100,000 migrants among us, when uncountable millions will be on the way?" Orban said.
A
central Budapest rally by Hungary's third-largest party, the
neo-fascist Jobbik, underscored why many of those seeking sanctuary in
Europe wanted to get through the country as quickly as possible. Earlier
in the week, many of the same Jobbik activists traveled south to the
border with Serbia to hurl verbal abuse point-blank at newly arrived
travelers.
Jobbik leader Gabor Vona told the
crowd of 300 waving Hungarian and party flags "that Hungary belongs to
the Hungarians. We like everybody, we respect everybody - but we don't
want anybody coming here."
Other speakers
branded supporters of refugee rights "traitors" and "scum." Activists'
placards included appeals for "Deportation, not work permits!" and
"Border closures! We don't want immigrants!"
The
contrast could not have been greater in Vienna's central train station.
When around 400 asylum seekers arrived on the morning's first border
train, charity workers offered supplies displayed in labeled shopping
carts containing food, water and packages of hygiene products for men
and women. Austrian onlookers cheered the migrants' arrival, with many
shouting "Welcome!" in both German and Arabic. One Austrian woman pulled
from her handbag a pair of children's rubber rain boots and handed them
to a Middle Eastern woman carrying a small boy.
Sami
Al Halbi, a 28-year-old veterinarian from Hama in Syria, said he fled
to avoid mandatory military service. "They asked me to join the army. I
am educated. For years I've been holding a pen. I do not want to hold a
weapon," he said. "We all want to have a better future."
It
got better as travelers continued west on more trains, some of them
specially provided for the migrants. As Austria's government noted,
virtually none of those coming intended to seek asylum before reaching
Germany, the Eurozone powerhouse that has pledged in particular to aid
Syrians fleeing from their 4-year-old civil war. Germany expects to
receive a staggering 800,000 asylum seekers this year.
In
Munich's central station, the first arrivals from Hungary received
sustained cheering and applause. Many who had endured nights sleeping on
crowded concrete floors at Budapest's Keleti station appeared
disoriented as Germans approached them holding trays of nibbles. Only
the youngest appeared quick to accept the new reality, brightening up
joyously as teddy bears were offered as gifts.
"We
are giving a warm welcome to these people today," said Simone Hilgers,
spokeswoman for Upper Bavaria government agencies tasked with providing
the migrants immediate support. "We realize it's going to be a big
challenge but everybody, the authorities and ordinary citizens, are
pulling together."
A total of about 6,000
people had come through Munich by Saturday evening, Hilgers said. All
were given
food and drink, and most were housed in temporary
accommodation.
The latest arrivals add to the
tens of thousands of migrants who have been streaming each month into
Germany, the EU's most populous nation with 81 million residents. The
influx has strained emergency accommodation and local bureaucracy,
triggered sporadic violence by neo-Nazi extremists, and also inspired
empathy from many more ordinary Germans. Volunteer groups have sprung up
to help asylum seekers find permanent housing and jobs, and to receive
free German language lessons. German media estimate this year's expected
bill for providing sanctuary to be 10 billion euros ($11 billion),
should the forecast 800,000 arrive.
Germany
typically places newcomers in housing earmarked for asylum seekers. They
are provided free meals, clothing, health care and household support,
as well as monthly spending money averaging 143 euros ($160). After
three months, they receive restricted work opportunities. By contrast
the migrants left behind a Hungary that stuck them in sweltering outdoor
facilities on the Serbian border, left any aid to private charities,
and pocketed the money they paid to buy cross-border train tickets that
they were blocked from using.
While Saturday's
surprise mass movement of migrants eased immediate pressure on Hungary,
officials warned that the human tide south of Hungary was still rising.
The
apparent futility of stopping the migrants' progress west was
underscored when Hungary announced Saturday morning that its emergency
bus services to the border had finished and would not be repeated.
Almost immediately two new groups hit the pavement to start long walks
to the border: about 200 people who walked out of an open-door refugee
camp near the city of Gyor, and about 300 who left Budapest's central
Keleti train station, the epicenter of Hungary's recent migrant crisis.
Hundreds more made their way independently west on foot and internal
train services.
A spokesman for Austria's
Interior Ministry, Karl-Heinz Grundboeck, said more than 7,000 asylum
seekers crossed the border Saturday from Hungary and most traveled by
train to Vienna or beyond.
