London complains over Hungary flyer

Budapest says migrants make parts of London, Paris and Brussels ‘nogo’ areas with threat of militant attacks

Britain has raised concerns with Hungary over a description of areas of London, Paris and Brussels as “no-go” areas dominated by illegal immigrants who increase the risk of militant attacks.

Ahead of an October 2 referendum on whether to reject European Union migrant quotas, Hungary released an official leaflet setting out the government’s case for voting “No”, including its views on the impact of migration and refugees on Western cities.

In one section, under the title “Forced resettlement poses a threat to our culture and traditions”, the leaflet includes a map of Europe detailing — in red — what it said were no-go areas where the authorities could not keep control. Cities so identified included London, Paris, Brussels and Berlin.

Other pages of the leaflet include a section on how “Illegal immigration increases the terror threat”.

“Immigrants mostly come from areas where European countries are carrying out military actions. This greatly increases the security risk,” the Hungarian leaflet said. “Terrorists deliberately and in a well-organised fashion take advantage of the lack of control to melt into the crowds of immigrants.” Britain’s embassy in Budapest raised concerns about the leaflet with the Hungarian government, whose head, Viktor Orban, says the EU should round up and deport all illegal immigrants.

“This leaflet is clearly inaccurate,” a spokesman for Britain’s Foreign Office said. “There are no areas in the UK in which the laws of the UK cannot be enforced.”

Portrayals ‘false’

London, the European Union’s biggest city by population, is sometimes portrayed abroad as a tense, immigrantdominated capital awash with a mix of poor immigrants, highly paid bankers and wealthy foreign oligarchs.

Many Londoners, including mayor Sadiq Khan, say such portrayals are false. Khan says London has benefited from immigration and portrays the city as a beacon of tolerance, Two Belgian policemen were arrested after being found in a French border town with a vanload of refugees, officials said yesterday, sparking a diplomatic incident.

The police van carrying 13 refugees and the two policemen was stopped by French police in Nieppe, a town on the Belgian border, on Tuesday evening, after crossing from Belgium.

The Belgian policemen were arrested and questioned before being released, an official source said.

The policemen, from Ypres, said they had picked up the refugees after finding them walking along a road in Belgium.

One of the officers, Georges Aeck, told Belgian broadcaster RTBF: “We didn’t want to leave them ... on the side of the road to walk to the border.

“So we took them ... in the direction they wanted to go.”

Belgium’s ambassador to France, Vincent Mertens de Wilmars, was summoned yesterday over the incident “so we can ask him for an explanation”, the French interior ministry said.

French authorities have already expressed “their strongest condemnation after this initiative which does not conform to the normal work practices agreed between France and Belgium”.

The Belgian police union said the French police had handcuffed their Belgian colleagues before questioning, a claim denied by the French authorities. The migrants were taken to a border police station in the northern French city of Lille. cohesion and integration.

Donald Trump, who is now US. Republican presidential nominee, said last year that parts of London and Paris were now so radicalised they could no longer be policed by officers, who feared for their lives.

That claim was denied by London police.

Earlier this month, stateowned Air China withdrew an in-flight magazine that warned visitors to be careful in parts of London populated by members of ethnic minorities.

“Precautions are needed when entering areas mainly populated by Indians, Pakistanis and black people,” the state-owned airline’s Wings of China magazine said in an article offering advice to visitors to London.