A city in Austria has mandated a curfew for underage migrants after a series of sex attacks at a festival over the past few days and has essentially put the migrants under house arrest.

The sexual assaults at the Welser Volksfest wine and beer festival have provoked sharp reactions from the city administration in the Austrian city of Wels. The city has decided that all migrants in the asylum homes in the city must return to their accommodation by 8pm and remain there until the morning. The city hopes that the move will prevent further sex attacks at the festival which lasts until the end of the week reports Kurier.

According to authorities at least eight women were sexually assaulted at the festival earlier in the week. The police say that all the attackers were asylum seekers from Afghanistan. The five Afghan men aged 15 to 16 are said to have groped the women’s breasts and tried to put their hands up their skirts in one of the beer tents at the event.

In reaction to the attacks the mayor of Wels, a member of the anti-mass migration Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ), said that in the aftermath of the attacks he would employ a “zero tolerance” policy toward the underage migrants. Taking to social media the mayor said that there would be serious consequences for any migrants who had sexually assaulted women in his city.

Vice mayor Gerhard Kroiss, also of the FPÖ, echoed the statements of the mayor and said that all the asylum homes have a duty to make sure they know where the young men under their care are and what they are doing. He said it was the responsibility of the homes to enact “preventative measures” to ensure the safety of women in the town.

Migrant sex attacks at various public festivals have become rampant since the mass attacks that occurred on New Year’s Eve in Cologne. The countries most affected by the attacks are Germany, Austria and Sweden. The cases have skyrocketed since the start of the summer.

In June at a festival in Darmstadt, Germany at least 18 girls, described as being “very young” were molested by asylum seekers. The sex attacks were repeated in July in Bremen where there were at least 24 cases of sexual assault by migrants at a music festival.

Some cities have tried to beef up security and police to tackle the rampant crime but it has seemingly little effect. In Sweden last month, the number of sexual assault cases had doubled, despite the extra security employed.

Later this month the largest festival in Europe, Oktoberfest, begins in Munich and some fear that the cases of sexual assault could repeat there on a much larger scale and authorities are also concerned about potential terror attacks leading to a proposal to ban backpacks from the event entirely.