BUDAPEST, Dec. 15 (Xinhua) -- Hungary has launched legal proceedings seeking compensation for financial penalties imposed by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) over its migration policy, Justice Minister Bence Tuzson said on Monday.

In a video posted on social media, Tuzson said Hungary was fined for "allegedly violating EU migration rules" by refusing entry to migrants and failing to comply with previous court orders. However, he described the CJEU's ruling as "undignified," and Hungary decided to take an unprecedented step to sue the court itself.

According to Tuzson, the penalty came after Hungary used transit zones in 2020 at the Hungary-Serbia border to detain arriving migrants, making them await asylum procedures or return. The CJEU ruled against Hungary's operation, describing it as a breach of EU asylum law.

Under a ruling in June 2024, the court held that Hungary had not taken the measures necessary to comply with the 2020 judgment and required the country to pay a lump-sum fine of 200 million euros (217.7 million U.S. dollars) and a daily penalty of 1 million euros until it brings its practices in line with EU law.

According to the Hungarian news agency (MTI), Tuzson called the fine "unprecedented in the EU's history" and blamed the court for failing to give a reasoning about the sum imposed. He said Hungary would not accept the ruling, claiming it contained several errors and was "unjust."

Noting that Hungary would take the case to the EU General Court, he argued that under the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, if an EU institution causes damage to a member state, it is obliged to provide compensation.

Prime Minister Viktor Orban has also repeatedly criticized the ruling, calling it "outrageous and unacceptable," and saying it places illegal migrants ahead of European citizens. (1 euro = 1.088 U.S. dollar) Enditem