Hungary Defense Minister Resigns, as Refugees Surge Past Border

​Hundreds of asylum-seekers burst through police barricades near Hungary's border with Serbia on Monday, heading towards the country's capital city of Budapest. The chaos has led to the resignation of the country’s defense minister.

The asylum-seekers were chanting "Freedom, freedom," according to local Hungarian media reports.

The incident occurred when border patrol agents were escorting a group of migrants to a nearby transit camp for fingerprint registration and processing their entry into the European Union's passport-free Schengen zone, according to a Reuters report.

Defense Minister Hende Csaba handed in his resignation on Monday over accusations that he was too slow in building a border fence to prevent the thousands of refugees from entering the country.

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A large majority of migrants arriving at the Hungarian border with Serbia have no identification, and authorities have no other way of verifying their identity apart from taking their word, border county police spokesman Szabolcs Szenti told RIA Novosti on Monday.

Hungary, which has become a primary entry destination for migrants traveling by land through Serbia and whose government is known for its harsh anti-immigration sentiments, announced last June it was building a 13-foot-high, 110-mile fence along its border with Serbia.

According to a recent survey carried out by the Hungarian government, 80 percent of the public favor a tougher approach on immigration and 60 percent said immigration and terrorism were linked.