Civil groups also supplied stacks of firewood to help migrants warm by the campfire out in the open. So far this year police have picked up 169,337 illegal migrants and caught 955 people smugglers, while the immigration office has registered 157 746 migrants, according to official briefings on Tuesday.

The immigration office is working round the clock at ten points around the country to process asylum applications, Attila Kiss, the office’s deputy chief told a news conference. A police spokesman noted that migrants who broke out of the Röszke registration area and started making their way on foot towards Budapest on Monday had been persuaded to get on buses back to Röszke after police closed down a section of the M5 motorway.

Nearly 1,000 migrants broke through the line formed by police at the Röszke camp and moved on to the M5 motorway. Police blocked traffic on the motorway for safety reasons.

After walking more than 10 kilometres, a group of about 150 migrants, among them women and children, stopped to rest. Buses then arrived on the motorway to collect the migrants and take them back to the Röszke camp. Police did not use force to get the migrants onto the buses.

Police on Monday picked up 2,471 migrants, 660 children among them, who illegally crossed Hungary’s southern border, a police spokesman for Csongrád County said.

The authorities have started immigration proceedings against them. Across the country, police caught 2,706 people who had crossed the border illegally.

Twelve suspected people smugglers were also apprehended, the national police headquarters (ORFK) said on Tuesday.

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MTI photo: Kelemen Zoltán Gergely