EU Interior Minister
On Monday, Budapest hosted an informal meeting of EU interior ministers as part of Hungary’s Council Presidency.
As Interior Minister Sándor Pintér announced, the discussions were about “the future of a community based on freedom, security and the enforcement of the law.” Deficiencies were uncovered that had damaged the EU’s internal security. The security of the EU cannot be maintained by the member states acting alone, but only by working together. It must also be acknowledged that the economic burdens must be distributed fairly. Pintér therefore proposed setting up a central fund to finance the tasks at hand. The new border control system, which will advance the fight against terrorism, will be launched by November at the latest. The minister noted that it would be good if not only the authorities but also the citizens were informed about the new system.
As far as the external dimension of illegal immigration is concerned, there was agreement that there will be no great progress without increased cooperation with third countries. The need was also expressed to set up institutions to carry out the concerted deportation of people who are not entitled to refugee status. This is necessary to speed up these procedures and make them more efficient. (Here there was talk again of the next Community fund to secure financing.)
When asked by journalists, Pintér admitted that only ten ministers had travelled to the meeting (see von der Leyen boycott), but that this was a decent number for an informal meeting. More importantly, he said, the colleagues present had demonstrated the highest level of expertise and had held constructive discussions.
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