Fully 78% of persecution against religious groups is committed against Christians, he added. Such attacks are most frequent in the Middle East, including areas involved in the migrant crisis.

It is important to call attention to this problem, Balog said. Europe needs to be protected and Hungary rejects migration in order to prevent cultural erosion, he said. At the same time, the government will help those in need and pays special attention to offering humanitarian aid.

The deputy state secretariat will be tasked with coordinating ongoing humanitarian projects such as a school for Christian children being built in Erbil, in Iraqi Kurdistan. The setting up of the deputy state secretary’s office first came up during Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s visit in the Vatican.

The office will be supervised by Bence Rétvári and it will be headed by Tamás Török, who has been working in this area, including in the Vatican, for decades, Balog said.

The opposition Dialogue for Hungary (PM) party said in response to the announcement that the secretariat had only been set up for propaganda purposes.

Márta V Naszályi, the party’s politician, said that after the Oct. 2 migrant quota referendum, the secretariat would be reduced to a source of financing for government affiliates before being shut down.

Naszályi called on the government to reveal why such a secretariat was being created in the middle of a campaign and why they had decided to spend exactly 3 million euros on setting it up.

PM also wants to know how much of that money would go towards helping those in need and how much would be spent on paying the secretariat’s staff, she said.

Republished with permission of Hungary Matters, MTI’s daily newsletter.

MTI photo: Sóki Tamás