Hungary has been ordered by the European Court of Justice to pay a fine of €200 million ($216 million) and a further €1 million per day for not implementing previous rulings to change its asylum policies.
The ruling followed a previous court judgement in December 2020 concerning procedures for granting international protection and returning third-country nationals.
According to a court press release on Thursday, the failure to implement that judgement "constitutes an unprecedented and extremely serious infringement of EU law."
The judges ruled that "Hungary has not taken the measures necessary to comply with the 2020 judgment as regards access to the international protection procedure, the right of applicants for international protection to remain in Hungary pending a final decision on their appeal against the rejection of their application and the removal of illegally staying third-country nationals."