Hungary Tells EU its National Card Poses No Danger to Schengen Zone

Hungary’s National Card does not pose any risk to the Schengen Area, Sandor Pinter, the country’s interior minister, reportedly wrote to Ylva Johansson, the EU’s commissioner for home affairs, in a letter which should have reached Brussels by August 19 but might’ve been delayed due to the public holidays in Hungary.

Hungary’s response – seen but not fully published by the government-close outlet Index.hu – followed complaints by eight EU member states to the European Commission about Hungary’s decision in July to extend its National Card scheme, designed to ease the entry of guest workers from Serbia and Ukraine, to a further six countries – four from the Western Balkans, (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Moldova), plus Russia and Belarus.

“Russia is a security threat. We need more, not less vigilance. Giving potential Russian spies and saboteurs easy EU access would undermine the security of us all,” the commissioner wrote in a letter addressed to Hungary’s Ministry of Interior on August 1, giving them 18 days to respond.

MEPs had urged the European Commission to introduce new measures to safeguard European citizens, including new controls at Hungarian borders, effectively expelling Hungary from the visa-free zone, if necessary.

In its reply, the Hungarian Interior Ministry argued that: “Hungary will apply the same migration and security screening for National Card applications as for other residence permits. The National Card will be issued taking into account the relevant EU standards and the security risks involved.”

Hungary continues to attach great importance to the protection of its national security and the Schengen Area as a whole, the minister added. “The EU’s sanction lists are constantly monitored by the immigration authority and persons on these lists cannot be issued with a permit,” the letter read, according to Index.hu.

Yet the Hungarian response did not answer the key question of why Hungary decided to extended the scheme to Belarus and Russia, which have not traditionally sent guest workers to Hungary, just three days after Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban made a surprise visit to meet Vladimir Putin in Moscow in early July.

Under pressure from the European Parliament and EU member states, especially the Baltics which have particularly suffered from the migrant crisis being fomented by Russia and Belarus at their borders, the Hungarian government is now trying to play down the significance of the National Card scheme, which has a number of benefits over the simple guest worker status. Although both need to have pre-existing work permits, national card holders can bring their families, stay for a maximum of two years, which can be extended by another three, and applications can be approved in 21 days – meaning less time for security clearance.

The Hungarian government has pointed out that “less than one per cent of Russian and Belarusian citizens in the EU live in Hungary”, whose diaspora is much larger in Austria, the Czech Republic or Poland.

The government also said it does not expect the number to significantly exceed the number of residence permits already issued. According to the Statistical Office, there are currently 7,883 Russian citizens living in Hungary, which is more than twice as many as ten years ago and a 20 per cent increase since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

But the letter also reveals that the Hungarian authorities – which approved a total of 31 refugee applications in 2023, nine of whom are Russians – have become surprisingly efficient in processing the National Cards, approving already five Russian and two Belarusian applications out of 33 since July, while the rest are still pending.