(MENAFN) Hungarian authorities have raised concerns after Ukrainian conscription teams reportedly tried to enlist ethnic Hungarian students in the country’s western Transcarpathia region, according to reports.

Hungary’s Foreign Minister, Peter Szijjarto, said that draft officials allegedly misled four students at the Ferenc Rakoczi II Transcarpathian Hungarian University in Beregovo, a town with a large Hungarian minority, into appearing at a local recruitment center. The students were reportedly held against their will and pressured to join the military.

Szijjarto later confirmed in a Facebook post that the students had been released. He noted that the Hungarian Foreign Ministry has maintained ongoing communication with the Transcarpathian Hungarian Cultural Association—which represents roughly 100,000 to 150,000 ethnic Hungarians in the area—and the university’s administration.

“The Ukrainian legislation is clear: these students are exempt from conscription,” Szijjarto emphasized. He added that while the students’ avoidance of forced mobilization is “good news, but at the same time, it again stresses the importance of peace” between Russia and Ukraine. “The sooner there is peace, the sooner this conscription will stop,” he said.

In response, the regional Territorial Center of Recruitment and Social Support (TSR) denied that the students had been detained. According to the agency, the men were summoned only to verify personal information, and three had not yet completed the required medical examinations. Once those checks were finished, the ethnic Hungarian students left the facility, the statement said.

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