Winnipeg Free Press Newspaper Archives Sep 3 2015, Page 15

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - September 3, 2015, Winnipeg, Manitoba C M Y K PAGE A15 winnipegfreepress. com WORLD WINNIPEG FREE PRESS, THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 2015 A 15 R E A D E R O F F E R | M I N D G A M E S P U Z Z L E B O O K winnipegfreepress. com / subscribe- new/ Call: 204- 697- 7001 | 1- 800- 542- 8900 Email: fpcirc@ winnipegfreepress. com STAY SHARP this SUMMER Time to find a place to relax, put up your feet and challenge yourself with our 40- page weekly puzzle book. CROSSWORDS SUDOKU WORD SLEUTH SCRABBLE CALCUDOKU JUMBLE HIDATO BANANAGRAMS AND MORE MIND GAMES * If you are a 6- day Winnipeg Free Press subscriber. Rates vary. MIND a publication from the SUBSCRIBE TODAY! $ 1 50 / WEEK* Home delivery included For as low as B UDAPEST, Hungary — Hundreds of frustrated refugees demanding passage to Germany jostled with riot police beside Budapest’s main international train station Wednesday as Hungary spent a second day trying to keep thousands of asylum- seekers from spilling deeper into Europe. Scores of officers pushed back the crowd, which shouted in Arabic and English to be permitted to march around the Keleti train station, which has become the latest focal point for European tensions over an unrelenting flow of refugees from the Middle East, Asia and Africa. Passions flared on Hungary’s border with Serbia as right- wing nationalist protesters marched to the location where refugees use a train track to walk into the country. Police formed protective circles around them as the demonstrators from the hard- line Jobbik party screamed abuse at them. The 28- nation European Union has been at odds for months on how to deal with the influx of more than 332,000 refugees this year. Such front- line nations as Greece, Italy and Hungary have pleaded for more help, while Germany, which is expecting to receive an EU- leading 800,000 asylum- seekers this year, has appealed for EU partners to bear more of the load. “ We have to reinstate law and order at the borders of the European Union, including the border with Serbia,” Hungarian government spokesman Zoltan Kovacs said. He said Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orban, will take a “ clear and obvious message” to a meeting today with EU chiefs in Brussels. On Hungary’s border with Serbia, some 300 extremists led by Jobbik party leaders waved Hungarian and party flags as they marched to the border crossing and shouted at the frightened group — many of whom had just completed a daylong trek along the rail line — to go back where they came from. Police escorted more than 50 asylumseekers out of harm’s way and, in an unusual move, permitted them to run free through a field rather than start the process of claiming asylum. Hundreds of others stayed on the Serb side of the border until the protesters dispersed. “ I am a mother, I am Hungarian, this is Hungary, and they have to go home,” said 57- year- old protester Aniko Cserep. Meantime, at least 12 refugees, including five children, drowned off the Turkish coast Wednesday when two boats carrying them to the Greek island of Kos capsized, Turkish officials said. The tides washed up the body of one boy on the beach, causing witnesses to cry. Authorities were still searching for two others after the boats sank in separate incidents off the Turkish Aegean coastal resort of Bodrum. In France, trains to Britain resumed normal service Wednesday after serious overnight disruptions triggered by reports of refugees running on the tracks and trying to climb atop trains. Hungary’s police reinforced their positions outside the Keleti terminal as the volume of refugees arriving from Serbia grows by the hour, with 3,000 already encamped near the station. Officers working with colleagues from Austria, Germany and Slovakia were searching for asylum- seekers travelling on Hungarian trains. For its part, the Czech Republic announced Wednesday it no longer intended to prevent Syrians who had already claimed asylum in Hungary from travelling via its territory to Germany. The Czechs previously had detained Syrians, as well as those from other nations, for up to 42 days. The policy change may allow the Syrians to travel more freely to Germany’s capital because the most direct Hungarian trains to Berlin pass through the Czech Republic. The Hungarian government didn’t explain why it permitted more than 1,000 refugees to leave Budapest by train Monday, but stopped the practice Tuesday and Wednesday, dashing the hopes of thousands who had bought train tickets. Hungary insisted it was complying with EU rules by blocking the refugees. They “ are not entitled to move freely within the European Union even after entering Hungary,” Kovacs told The Associated Press. “ If ( they) don’t comply with the very basic rules that are in place in the European Union, there is no solution to this problem.” Kovacs also defended Hungary’s four- metre- high fence being built on the border with Serbia and tougher laws it expects to enact in a couple of weeks. Those laws would allow authorities to fast- track decisions on asylum requests and make it a criminal offence to cross the border except at designated areas. “ We’re going to thwart any effort to come to Hungary by illegal means,” Kovacs said. The clampdown on train travel from Budapest has had an immediate effect on Germany. German police reported Wednesday only about 50 refugees arrived on the morning trains to Munich, compared with 2,400 Tuesday. The Greek coast guard said it had rescued 1,058 people in 28 Aegean Sea locations in the past 24 hours. More than 200,000 people have reached Greece this year, chiefly from neighbouring Turkey, where more than one million live in refugee camps fuelled by warfare in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. Police also arrested six suspected smugglers in northern Greece after finding 103 refugees, including 19 children, hidden in a truck. And in Vienna, police continued to interrogate the 30- year- old Romanian driver of a van that was discovered Tuesday containing 24 Afghans on the outskirts of the Austrian capital. Police spokesman Thomas Kleibinger said the truck’s rear doors had been padlocked to keep the Afghan men, aged 16 to 20, trapped inside, and the windows were sealed to prevent fresh air from getting inside the container. He said those inside were freed in good health because they had spent relatively little time inside. In France, passengers aboard one Paris- to- London train said their service was suspended because refugees trying to climb aboard the train had damaged fire equipment. In tweets, passengers also described seeing people running along the roofs of another train near the French port of Calais. “ Just before we got to the ( Channel) Tunnel it was chaos. The lights went off and the air conditioning went off. It was so hot,” London resident Bridget Roussel said. “ I’ve never experienced anything like that in my life.” In non- EU member Iceland, a movement is challenging the government’s pledge to host only 50 Syrians, taking to social media to urge their government to do more. Some residents committed to opening their homes to refugees while others urged the government to turn an old army base into housing for them. Naval vessels from several countries patrolled the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Libya Wednesday in hopes of preventing more mass drownings. A Norwegian vessel carried about 800 people who were rescued to the Italian island of Sardinia. — The Associated Press Train station flashpoint for refugee crisis Hungary stops passage to Germany By Shawn Pogatchnik and Pablo Gorondi ZOLTAN BALOGH / MTI VIA THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Asylum- seekers charge their cellphones outside the Keleti Railway Station in Budapest, Hungary, Wednesday. A_ 15_ Sep- 03- 15_ FP_ 01. indd A15 9/ 2/ 15 8: 45: 41 PM