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Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Saturday there was a clear link between illegal migrants heading to Europe and a rising threat of terrorism, justifying his conservative government’s tough anti-immigration stance, Reuters reports.

The landlocked central European country is part of Europe’s visa-free Schengen zone, making it attractive to migrants coming through the Balkans. It has registered more than 80,000 migrants so far this year, nearly double the number in all of 2014.

Most are from poor or conflict-ridden countries like Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, looking to move on to wealthier western Europe.
Hungary plans to complete a four-metre-high (12 feet) fence along its border with southern neighbour Serbia by November to stem the flow of migrants. The plan has drawn criticism from Serbia as well as the United Nations’ refugee agency.

“There is a clear link between illegal migrants coming to Europe and the spread of terrorism,” Orban said in an annual speech in Romania, where he usually outlines his political vision for the coming years.

“It is obvious that we simply cannot filter out hostile terrorists from this enormous crowd.”

The issue of migration has become highly politicised in Hungary, with Orban’s government mounting a billboard campaign telling migrants to respect Hungary’s laws and stoking fears that foreigners could snatch the jobs of Hungarians.

“Our answer is clear: we would like to preserve Europe for Europeans … and this also requires an effort from other (countries),” Orban said. “But there is something that we would not only like but we want: to preserve Hungary for Hungarians.”