Hungary–Serbia border
A short, flat line across the Pannonian plain, drawn by the Treaty of Trianon in 1920, which left the Hungarians of Vojvodina on the Serbian side. In 2015 it became the front line of Europe’s refugee crisis when Hungary sealed it with a razor-wire fence.
Written from cited sourcesLast checked 28 September 2026Suggest a correction
See it on the globe:Hungary →Serbia →
Trianon
Hungary was on the losing side in the First World War, and under the Treaty of Trianon, signed at Versailles on 4 June 1920, it lost around two-thirds of its territory. Its proposal to hold referendums in the areas being considered was rejected, and it had virtually no influence on the outcome. Lands it lost are now in Croatia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia and Ukraine.[1]
About 2 million ethnic Hungarians live in the neighbouring countries, most of them in Serbia’s autonomous province of Vojvodina, Romania’s Transylvania and western Ukraine. Viktor Orbán’s government made the treaty’s anniversary a national day in 2010, and from 2011 offered citizenship to ethnic Hungarians in the former Hungarian lands, with voting rights from 2012.[1]
“The diktat saw two-thirds of the country’s territory and 63 percent of its population shorn from us.”[1]
The fence
In 2015 about a million refugees travelled the Balkan route through the former Yugoslav republics towards Germany and Western Europe.[3] Hungary completed a razor-wire fence along its border with Serbia, and on 15 September a new border regime came into force: irregular entry became a crime punishable by up to eight years in prison, Serbia was declared a “safe country” to which asylum seekers could be returned, and border crossings could be closed. The government declared a state of emergency over “mass immigration” the next day.[2]
Human Rights Watch reported that thousands of people were left trapped in Serbia, and that riot police used water cannon and tear gas against people trying to cross at the closed Röszke crossing on 16 September. Of 98 asylum applications made at the border on the first evening, Hungarian officials said 48 had been rejected by the next day.[2]
In 2016 Hungary became the only EU country with a law declaring pushbacks, returning asylum seekers across the border without due process, legal. Frontex counted irregular crossings on the route falling from 764,033 in 2015 to 5,869 in 2018 before rising to 60,541 in 2021, and hundreds of people were sheltering in abandoned buildings near Horgoš and other Serbian border villages, some describing beatings by Hungarian police.[3]
Timeline
19204 June 1920
Treaty of Trianon
Hungary loses around two-thirds of its territory.[1]
2010
National day
Hungary makes 4 June a day of national unity.[1]
201515 September 2015
Border sealed
The fence is completed and a new border regime begins.[2]
2016
Pushback law
Hungary legalises pushbacks at the border.[3]
More borders
Sources
- [1]Why Is Viktor Orban Keeping The 100-Year-Old Treaty Of Trianon Alive? · Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty · 24 April 2024
- [2]Hungary: New Border Regime Threatens Asylum Seekers · Human Rights Watch · 19 September 2015
- [3]Migrants cope with freezing weather, violence on Hungary border · Al Jazeera · 18 February 2022
Map geometry from Natural Earth via world-atlas. See credits.