Orban: Hungary will defy EU court ruling on asylum policy

Hungary's prime minister says his country won't change its immigration policies despite a recent ruling from the European Union's top court that found them in contradiction with the bloc’s laws

BUDAPEST -- Hungary will not change its immigration policies despite a recent ruling from the European Union’s top court that found them in contradiction with the bloc's laws, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said Tuesday.

Orban's announcement came as Hungary's anti-immigration government is locked in a dispute with the EU over the bloc's jurisdiction over the affairs of its 27 members, especially concerning his government's policies on immigration and LGBT issues.

A ruling last year by the European Court of Justice found that Hungary had failed to respect EU law by conducting pushbacks of people entering the country without authorization, denying them the right to apply for asylum and detaining them in “transit zones” along Hungary's southern border with Serbia.

But during a rare news conference in Budapest on Tuesday, the right-wing populist Orban insisted that Hungary would continue its migration policies, and that "it doesn’t matter what the European court ruled. Hungary must continue to defend its borders.”