Refugees and migrants have been transported to a registration centre by Hungarian authorities hoping to defuse tensions at the country's border with Serbia.
A steady stream of people continue to approach Hungary, which they see as their gateway into the EU.
Hungary has made frantic and confused efforts to control the tide of migrants entering the country as they try to reach Germany, leaving many trapped for days outside the border village of Roszke.
The UN refugee agency said it is concerned about the lack of proper reception facilities in the border area and that humanitarian aid needs to be stepped up there. A spokesman said “the border police are not trained to deal with the refugees”.
“When people come in you need to receive them properly. There are women and children and they are just kept in the open. Temperatures are going down as well so we need to have a system where these people receive proper care,” he said.
At Budapest's Keleti train station, migrants were being allowed to board trains bound for Austria and Germany. In many cases, they were segregated from other passengers and told they could only enter certain carriages.
In Greece, the coast guard said its patrol vessels picked up nearly 500 migrants in 11 search and rescue missions over the previous 24 hours in the eastern Aegean Sea.
The people, whose nationalities were not immediately clear, were found in small boats near the islands of Lesbos — which accounts for nearly one in two migrant arrivals in Greece — Samos, Kos and the islet of Agathonissi.
More than 15,000 refugees and migrants are stranded on Lesbos, awaiting screening before they can board a ferry to the Greek mainland — from where they head north through Macedonia, Serbia and Hungary to seek asylum in more prosperous European countries. – (PA)