Human traffickers shoot at Hungarian police during highway chase

The Austrian outlet eXXpress reported on the police operation.

Drivers who were driving on M1 highway towards Budapest on Monday morning must have literally felt like they were the real actors in the wrong violent action movie. What unsuspecting motorists experienced was not the usual traffic. It became a life-threatening journey instead.

Hungarian police on Wednesday released on-board camera footage of the patrol car chasing a van carrying two Iraqi smugglers and 21 migrants on the M1 highway. During the chase, shots were fired from the van at the moving police car.

The shooting continued even when the smugglers had to jump out of the van to escape because of a traffic jam: While trying to escape, they kept shooting at the police car. Counter-terrorism forces eventually arrested the two men posing as Iraqi citizens.

The Hungarian police had their hands full

The increasing violence by migrants and people smugglers poses a serious threat to Hungary’s internal security, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s chief adviser for internal security, György Bakondi, told Hungarian state television last week.

Bakondi pointed out that the Hungarian border guards had already picked up 244 000 cross-border entrants this year. In 2021 there were 105 000 in the same period. According to Bakondi, the figures clearly show that the pressure to migrate is increasing.

Orbán’s security adviser pointed out that Hungary had massively strengthened border protection this year. This is all the more necessary as the border police are increasingly being attacked by groups of migrants.

A recent study by the Hungarian Migration Research Institute confirmed Bakondi’s statements. According to the institute, attacks by human traffickers on the border police are increasing – and not just on the border, but also in the interior. Security expert József Horváth told the Magyar Nemzet newspaper that smugglers were under increasing “pressure to perform”, leading criminals to become more militant and violent.

Talks with Serbia and Austria

In October the Hungarian Prime Minister started a series of talks with the Austrian Chancellor and the Serbian President at the Castle Garden Bazaar in Budapest on illegal immigration.

The leaders of the three countries were being affected by it in the most severe possible way, according to Orbán: “We all three are suffering from illegal migration.” He observed that this absorbed much energy and live force as well as enormous amounts of money.

Hungary initiated this meeting “because we are in the most complex situation,” given that the country has a migration problem from two directions. In consequence of the Russo-Ukrainian war, more than a million refugees have arrived from the easterly direction, from Ukraine, and meanwhile the borders are also “under permanent siege” from the south, he said.

“We see no change in the Brussels policy that encourages migration, the re-distribution quotas are placed on the agenda time and again,” he added.