Supporting legal migration and visa facilitation are priorities of both the Migration Strategy and the seven-year strategy planning document related to the European Union Asylum and Migration Fund for the years 2014-2020. The strategy was published on Monday on the website of the Hungarian Government.

The objectives of the strategy are to strengthen user-friendly public administration for the entry and residence of foreigners, to ensure high-level protection for those who have left their homes to flee persecution and to improve the integration of foreigners in Hungary, while at the same time to adequately covering all safety aspects.

The strategy supports all forms of legal migration: through adequate legal instruments it provides for long-term residence, resettlement, acquisition of Hungarian nationality and it pays specific attention to the simplified naturalisation procedure of people originally belonging to the Hungarian diaspora. It ensures the protection required by international and national norms for asylum seekers and facilitates the social integration of legal migrants and the beneficiaries of international protection in Hungary. The strategy provides significant support for stateless persons and combats illegal migration.  According to the strategy, Hungary is a transit country and also a destination country for immigrants. In the context of visa policy it has been determined that Hungary has been a full member of the Schengen area since December 2007 and therefore it cannot independently order the issuing of visas. European Union rules allow quite limited opportunities for Member States to realise their migration objectives through visa policy.

Tourism development and supporting growth in tourism are strong economic interests of Hungary and are at the same time related to the “Opening to the East” policy. In case of countries in good economic condition (e.g. Turkey, the Gulf States, Russia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan) Hungary aims to simplify the entry procedure, supporting visa-free travel at EU level in the belief that the number of businessmen, investors and tourists will grow. Additional attention shall be paid to assessing the actual material situation of organisations sending and organizing the travel of foreign persons to sports and cultural events or conferences.

(Ministry of Interior)