(MENAFN- The Peninsula) A mass of desperate refugees stranded at Budapest's main rail station for days set off on foot for the Austrian border yesterday, despite mounting efforts by Hungary to crack down on a deepening crisis that is straining Europe's unity.
With tensions growing across a divided EU, the human cost was underlined as the father of Syrian toddler Aylan Kurdi, whose drowning on the crossing to Europe shocked the world, buried his family in their war-torn hometown. "I will have to pay the price for this the rest of my life," the devastated father told mourners.
Germany urged an end to "recriminations" as Britain said it would take in thousands more Syrian refugees - but only direct from camps, not those already in overstretched Hungary, Greece and Italy who are demanding their EU partners do more to help.
Hungary has become the newest flashpoint as thousands of migrants try to get to Western Europe, particularly Germany which has said it will no longer deport Syrian refugees and will take in 800,000 people this year.
In the Hungarian capital, a crowd of migrants put at more than 1,000, including people in wheelchairs and on crutches, set off determined to get to the Austrian border some 175km away.
Hungary's right-wing Prime Minister Viktor Orban sparked anger by saying his country did not want more Muslim migrants and warned that Europe would lose its Christian identity, as well as lashing out at Germany for failing to deal with the crisis.
Hungarian lawmakers passed tough new anti-immigration measures, including criminalising illegal border crossing and vandalism to a razor-wire fence erected along the border with Serbia. Some 50,000 migrants arrived in Hungary last month via the western Balkans.
UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres warned the EU faced a "defining moment" and called for the mandatory resettlement of 200,000 refugees by EU states.
Germany and France back quotas, but Hungary, the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia together rejected any quota systems in a statement yesterday.
Charities across Europe, meanwhile, reported a surge in donations. British Prime Minister David Cameron, under pressure to act, said Britain would provide an extra £100m ($153m) in humanitarian aid for the Syrian crisis. The International Olympic Committee launched an emergency $2.2m fund. The Malta-based Migrant Offshore Aid Station had received $666,500 since Aylan's photo went viral.
Outspoken Irish rocker Bob Geldof pledged to take in four Syrian families at his two homes. And Bayern Munich football club pledged ¤1m to aid groups, and said it was organising a friendly game at which it hoped to raise a further ¤1m for the migrants.
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