The father of the little boy photographed dead on a Turkish beach is preparing to take the bodies of his two sons and his wife home to Syria.
The Guardian reports that Abdullah Kurdi, a Kurdish Syrian who had been living in Turkey for three years before setting out for Greece aboard an inflatable board, has said he no longer wants to go to the West.
The Guardian says: “Speaking outside the mortuary where the bodies of his two sons were being held, Kurdi said: “I just want to see my children for the last time and stay forever with them.”
“Kurdi described what had happened on board the boat heading for Greece, saying the captain had panicked because of high waves and jumped into the sea, leaving him in control of the small craft.
“I took over and started steering. The waves were so high and the boat flipped. I took my wife and my kids in my arms and I realised they were all dead.”
Photographs of the children laying face down in the sand have horrified the world.
TENS of thousands of people trying to leave Syria because of the war must be turned back, says Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orban.
Speaking from a crisis meeting in Brussels, Mr Orban said quotas would only encourage more people to head for Europe from the Middle East and Africa.
“Quotas is an invitation for those who want to come,” he said. “The moral human thing is to make clear, please don’t come.”
The Telegraph in Britain reports that the Hungarian leader is on the front line of the crisis. More than 50,000 immigrants have crossed into Hungary from Serbia this year alone, with an average of 2000 a week crawling under barbed wire and wading through rivers to get to the central train station, from where they hope to catch trains to Paris, London and Germany.
Most have valid train tickets, but no visas.
Mr Orban says Europe is “in the grip of madness over immigration and refugees’ and arguing that ‘he was defending European Christianity against a Muslim influx.”
“Everything which is now taking place before our eyes threatens to have explosive consequences for the whole of Europe,” Orban said. “Europe’s response is madness.
“Those arriving have been raised in another religion, and represent a radically different culture. Most of them are not Christians, but Muslims.
“This is an important question, because Europe and European identity is rooted in Christianity. Is it not worrying in itself that European Christianity is now barely able to keep Europe Christian? There is no alternative, and we have no option but to defend our borders … If Europe does not return to the path of common sense, it will find itself laid low in a battle for its fate.”
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