NICKELSDORF/VIENNA/HEGYESHALOM: Thousands of exhausted migrants streamed into Austria from Hungary on Saturday, in what Vienna called a “wake up call” for Europe to get to grips with its biggest refugee influx since WWII.
After days of confrontation and chaos, Hungary’s right-wing government deployed dozens of buses to take migrants from Budapest and pick up over 1,000 others, many of them refugees from the Syrian war, who had set off doggedly by foot on Friday down the main highway to Vienna.
Austria said it had agreed with Germany that it would allow the migrants access, waiving the rules of an asylum system brought to breaking point by Europe’s worst refugee crisis since the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s.
“This has to be an eye opener how messed up the situation in Europe is now,” Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz said as he arrived for talks in Luxembourg with his EU peers dominated by the crisis. “I hope that this serves as a wake up call that (the situation) cannot continue.”
Austrian police said that 4,000 people crossed the border during the night and on Saturday morning, with the number predicted to rise later to 10,000.
Their arrival followed the decision by Hungary, which has become a flashpoint in the crisis, to bus thousands of migrants stranded in Budapest for days to the Austrian border. The packed buses, in which people were strewn across the floors, using bottles for pillows, departed all through the night.
Hungary laid on the buses after around 1,200 migrants set out on foot from Budapest for the Austrian border, 175 km away, and after large numbers escaped from refugee camps.
Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto blamed Saturday the “failed migration policy of the EU and ... irresponsible statements made by some European politicians.”
At least 500 more migrants embarked on similar march from Budapest toward the Austrian border Saturday, an AFP correspondent in the Hungarian capital said.
There appeared to be no more buses however to ferry them to the frontier. People arriving off buses earlier walked across the frontier to the Austrian town of Nickelsdorf where authorities had set up a makeshift shelter.
“The streams (of people) keep coming,” Hans Peter Doskozil, chief of police in Burgenland state, who was at the border, said Saturday morning. Looking exhausted but happy, most boarded special buses and trains to Vienna, to take trains bound for Salzburg and from there continue to Munich, or other services running to other German cities.
German police said they expected up to 7,000 of the migrants to reach German territory Saturday.
In Vienna, the migrants, some carrying sleeping children and many wrapped in blankets, were greeted by large numbers of volunteers handing out food, drinks, sanitary products and train tickets.
“My toes hurt, a lot of blood, we walked too much. I want to go (to) Germany, but then I stop,” one 26-year-old Syrian man from Homs, both his feet wrapped in thick bandages, told AFP.
‘Wake up call’ as thousands of migrants pour into Austria
‘Wake up call’ as thousands of migrants pour into Austria
Israel bars UN secretary-general Guterres from entering country
Iran fired more than 180 ballistic missiles at Israel on Tuesday amid an escalation in fighting between Israel and its proxy in Lebanon, Hezbollah. Many were intercepted in flight but some penetrated missile defenses.
Guterres on Tuesday issued a brief statement after the missile attack condemning “the broadening of the Middle East conflict, with escalation after escalation.” Earlier on Tuesday, Israel had sent troops into southern Lebanon.
Israeli foreign minister Israel Katz said Guterres’ failure to call out Iran made him persona non grata in Israel.
“Anyone who cannot unequivocally condemn Iran’s heinous attack on Israel, as nearly all the countries of the world have done, does not deserve to set foot on Israeli soil,” Katz said.
“Israel will continue to defend its citizens and uphold its national dignity, with or without Antonio Guterres.”
UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric described the announcement as political and “just one one more attack, so to speak, on UN staff that we’ve seen from the government of Israel.” He said the UN traditionally does not recognize the concept of persona non grata as applying to UN staff.
During a Security Council meeting on Wednesday Guterres said: “As I did in relation to the Iranian attack in April — and as should have been obvious yesterday in the context of the condemnation I expressed — I again strongly condemn yesterday’s massive missile attack by Iran on Israel.”
Firefighters battle deadly Greece wildfire for fourth day
- Nearly 600 firefighters with 160 fire engines and 24 aircraft were deployed in the mountains above the Gulf of Corinth
- Three water bombers from Italy and Croatia have been sent to help
ATHENS: Hundreds of Greek firefighters battled for the fourth day Wednesday to control a wildfire in the Peloponnese region that has killed two people and burned huge swathes of forest.
Nearly 600 firefighters with 160 fire engines and 24 aircraft were deployed in the mountains above the Gulf of Corinth, where the fire broke out Sunday.
A dozen villages have been evacuated and two men who were helping firefighters became trapped and died in the flames. Three firefighters were also hurt.
Three water bombers from Italy and Croatia have been sent to help.
Government spokesman Pavlos Marinakis told an Athens radio station it was “a difficult fire” but authorities aimed “to have a full de-escalation in the disparate pockets (of fire) still burning today.”
The Athens national observatory said that according to the European Union’s Copernicus climate observatory, the fire has burned 6,500 hectares (16,000 acres) of forest and farmland.
A preliminary investigation suggested it may have been caused by a beekeeper smoking honey bees, officials said.
Another fire on Wednesday broke out nearby, in Kalavryta, but had been partially controlled, the fire department said. It added that more than 40 rural fires had been reported in 24 hours.
Russia rules out nuclear talks with US given its stance on NATO expansion
- “We see no point in dialogue with Washington without respect for Russia’s fundamental interests,” Zakharova said
MOSCOW: Russia has dismissed the possibility of nuclear talks with the United States citing Washington’s stance on NATO expansion, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Wednesday.
“We see no point in dialogue with Washington without respect for Russia’s fundamental interests. First of all, this is the problem of NATO’s expansion into the post-soviet space, which poses threats to common security,” Zakharova said.
On Tuesday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Russia will not discuss signing a new treaty with the United States to replace an agreement limiting each side’s strategic nuclear weapons that expires in 2026 as it needs to be broadened and expanded to cover other states.
Ukraine probes allegations Russia killed 16 POWs
- “This is the largest known case of the execution of Ukrainian prisoners of war on the front line,” Ukrainian prosecutor general Andriy Kostin said
- The probe — into allegations of the “violation of laws and customs of war” and “premeditated murder” — was launched based on videos shared on social media
KYIV: Ukraine is probing allegations the Russian army shot dead 16 prisoners of war near the eastern city of Pokrovsk, Kyiv’s prosecutor general said Tuesday.
Russia and Ukraine have repeatedly accused each other of killing POWs since Moscow launched its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
“This is the largest known case of the execution of Ukrainian prisoners of war on the front line,” Ukrainian prosecutor general Andriy Kostin said in a statement.
Kostin said the alleged incident showed that the “killing and torture of prisoners is not an accident but a deliberate policy of the Russian military and political leadership.”
The probe — into allegations of the “violation of laws and customs of war” and “premeditated murder” — was launched based on videos shared on social media that appeared to show the execution of Ukrainian soldiers, Kostin said.
Video images captured by a drone showed captured Ukrainian troops, under Russian control, coming out from a wooded area and lining up, Ukraine’s prosecutors said.
The Russians then “deliberately opened fire with deadly force,” Kyiv said.
Those still showing “signs of life” were then “finished off at close range with automatic fire.”
AFP could not independently verify the reports.
The Ukrainian prosecutor’s office said Tuesday that “measures are currently being taken to verify the published material.”
The alleged incident was reported to have taken place close to the villages of Sukhiyi Yar and Mykolayivka near Pokrovsk, a strategic hub that Russia is trying to capture.
It is the latest allegation of POWs being killed during the conflict.
In March 2023 a video showing an imprisoned Ukrainian soldier shouting “Glory to Ukraine!” moments before being executed by shooting squad, went viral.
The UN has documented “numerous violations of international humanitarian law against prisoners of war, including cases of summary execution of both Russian and Ukrainian POWs,” a spokeswoman for the UN Human Rights Office told AFP last year.
Philippines struggles to repatriate workers as Israel invades Lebanon
- Dozens of Filipinos sought shelter at the Philippine government’s Migrant Workers Office in Beirut
- Authorities in Manila seek charter flights, sea and land routes to evacuate nationals from Lebanon
MANILA: The Philippines is trying to arrange flights for hundreds of overseas Filipino workers in Beirut, the government said Wednesday, as it struggles to bring them to safety in the wake of Israel’s invasion of Lebanon.
More than 11,000 Filipinos are living and working in Lebanon, which has faced a series of Israeli attacks that began in mid-September, with pagers exploding at shops and hospitals around the country, followed by relentless bombing targeting densely populated areas.
Israeli forces have killed more than 1,000 people across Lebanon and wounded nearly 3,000, according to Lebanon’s Health Ministry.
The UN estimates that more than a million people across the country have been displaced by the strikes, with the numbers expected to rise as Israel also launched its ground invasion of Lebanon on Tuesday.
Dozens of Filipinos in Beirut have sought shelter at the Philippine government’s Migrant Workers Office. As its vicinity was bombed by Israeli forces over the weekend, they have since been sheltered in a hotel in Beit Mery, a town overlooking Beirut, as they await repatriation.
“There are presently 101 Filipino workers in our shelters ready to be repatriated,” DMW Undersecretary Bernard Olalia told reporters in Manila.
“The challenge is that we do not have flights … We’re talking to some airline companies so that the chartered flights will be able to accommodate for example no less than 300 overseas Filipino workers from Beirut.”
Olalia said that while the government was facing several challenges, including securing landing rights for chartered flights, other options were also being considered in case the situation escalated.
“The DMW is also studying the possibility of other routes. Apart from the air route, we will be assessing the sea and the land route, should … the situation there worsen,” he said.
“We have men on the ground. They work around the clock. And we augmented our staff both in Lebanon (and) nearby posts to be able to provide (the) safest route to evacuate and ultimately to facilitate the repatriation of our OFWs.”
Migrante International, a global alliance of overseas Filipino workers, told Arab News on Tuesday that the Philippine nationals it has been in touch with have expressed “urgent concern” for their safety.
“They are worried about the bombings and the explosions coming closer to their homes, in their communities. So, they are worried for their safety, they are worried for their life and not being able to go back home safely to their families,” Migrante International President Joanna Concepcion said.
“They feel there is nowhere safe anymore. They feel that Israel can target anywhere, anytime.”
