Hungary has agreed to allow thousands of Romanians who are trying to get home as Europe enters a coronavirus lockdown to transit Hungary at nighttime on designated routes, Romania’s prime minister said.
Ludovic Orban said he spoke to Hungarian Premier Viktor Orban on Wednesday after up to 6,000 Romanians from Italy, Spain and other western European countries were stranded at the Austrian-Hungarian border on Tuesday after Hungarian authorities shut the borders to non-Hungarians.
Hungary opened its borders and police escorted the Romanians who were traveling in hundreds of vehicles in a „humanitarian corridor” to the Romanian border, after Romanian Foreign Minister Bogdan Aurescu spoke to his Hungarian counterpart Peter Szijjarto.
More Romanians are expected to head to Romania in the coming period, and the two Orbans agreed that Romanian citizens would be allowed to transit Hungary from 9 p.m to 5 a.m under police escort on the main highway to the Romanian border.
Hungary has registered 50 coronavirus infections, one of whom has died, while Romania has 260 cases and no deaths.
There are millions of Romanians living in Italy and Spain, which have been hard-hit by the coronavirus epidemic and some trying to return to Romania where they are put in two weeks quarantine.
Orban said there would no longer be restrictions on goods coming to Romania via Hungary, after his conversation with the Hungarian leader. The two are not related.
„There were problems in Slovenia with good coming from Serbia but the flow of goods is now guaranteed,” he said.
