Plans to detain migrants in shipping container camps are in breach of EU law, says Amnesty International

This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

Hungary has been accused of “stooping to a new low” after it announced plans to detain all asylum seekers in shipping containers near the border with Serbia.

The government of prime minister Viktor Orbán says the measure is necessary to secure the EU’s borders and deter migrants coming into the country from the Middle East via Serbia. It has already set up two razor fences on the border with Serbia and is deploying more than 600 soldiers to guard the fence.

But Amnesty International said the measure was in clear contravention of EU law and the Refugee Convention.



According to the AFP news agency, asylum seekers are to be held at four military bases along the fence, where they will be housed in barracks built from shipping containers. Each camp will have room for 150 people, the agency reported.



The government is due to submit its proposal to parliament, which will then debate and vote on the measures within weeks. It will involve taking hundreds of existing asylum seekers to the container camps.



The new regulations will be implemented only as long as the government-declared state of emergency over mass migration is in place, such as the one currently in force.

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The government’s chief spokesman, Zoltán Kovács, had announced at a briefing in London this week that all asylum seekers will be detained during the entire period of their asylum application, rather than being released pending an appeal.

But giving further details following government meetings Orban’s chief of staff, János Lázár, said all current and future asylum seekers would be transferred to container camps in a so-called “transit zone” near the border, where they would be held for the duration of their asylum application process.

Asylum appeals would by default be conducted with the asylum seeker attending only via a video link to a court, rather than in person.

“People’s freedom of movement will be removed,” said Lázár. “They will be able to stay only in a place designated for them. This place will be the state border, where containers suitable for accommodating 200 to 300 people will be erected. Migrants will have to wait there for a legally binding decision on their claims.”

Gauri van Gulik, Amnesty International’s deputy director for Europe, said: “Rounding up all men, women and children seeking asylum and detaining them for months on end in container camps is a new low in Hungary’s race to the bottom on asylum seekers and refugees.

Gauri van Gulik (@GaurivanGulik) A deep new low. #Hungary wants to detain all asylum seekers in containers. https://t.co/XbMnZxsUEn pic.twitter.com/8nKalNHb7y

“By amending a raft of laws to lock up all asylum seekers, the Hungarian government will inflict unnecessary trauma, compounding what people seeking protection have already suffered. The government has in no way proven that the detention of each asylum seeker would be reasonable, necessary and proportionate. Detention should always be the last resort and not an knee-jerk reaction, as is the case here.



“This is further evidence that the EU needs to stand firm on Hungary’s flagrant disregard for European and international law.”

People seeking asylum cannot currently be detained in the so-called “transit zones” along Hungary’s border with Serbia for more than four weeks, after which they must be allowed inside the country. The reform under consideration would remove that time limit and introduce mandatory detention for the whole duration of the asylum procedure.

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Access to transit zones set up at the border with Serbia has already been severely restricted, human rights groups claim.

But Kovács said: “What we’ve seen in the past is asylum seekers abusing the legal framework of Hungarian and EU law. Instead of waiting for the final decision, they head for Germany and the Nordic countries and within [the] Schengen [Area] it is impossible to stop this.”

He promised that asylum seekers would be provided with food and education for children during their detention, adding that at any time an asylum seeker would be entitled to return to their country of origin.

Kovács was reluctant to guarantee access to the camps for the international media, but said the determination in Europe to protect its borders was hardening, as shown by the recent EU Malta summit, and challenged the rest of the EU to explain why they had not taken up Hungary’s stance earlier.

German chancellor Angela Merkel this week announced plans to be tougher with processing asylum seekers.