Then they jostled to formally enter the country so they could quickly leave it, heading toward more prosperous European Union nations on a desperate quest to escape war and poverty.
In Roszke, a Hungarian border town, migrants mostly from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan requesting asylum were being processed by authorities. Police used tear gas to break up a brief scuffle involving about 200 migrants, saying the migrants were growing impatient with delays in the registration process caused by the growing number of arrivals.
