Case of Shahzad v. Hungary
The Court: Decides to join to the merits the respondent Government’s objection concerning the applicant’s victim status, and dismisses it; Declares the application admissible; Holds that there has been a violation of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 to the Convention; Holds that there has been a violation of Article 13 of the Convention taken in conjunction with Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 to the Convention; Holds (a) that the respondent State is to pay the applicant, within three months from the date on which the judgment becomes final in accordance with Article 44 § 2 of the Convention, the following amounts, to be converted into the currency of the respondent State at the rate applicable at the date of settlement: (i) EUR 5,000 (five thousand euros), plus any tax that may be chargeable, in respect of non-pecuniary damage; (ii) EUR 5,000 (five thousand euros), plus any tax that may be chargeable to the applicant, in respect of costs and expenses; (b) that from the expiry of the above-mentioned three months until settlement simple interest shall be payable on the above amounts at a rate equal to the marginal lending rate of the European Central Bank during the default period plus three percentage points; Dismisses the remainder of the applicant’s claim for just satisfaction. 8 July 2021 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Topic(s): Safe third country | Countries: Hungary - Pakistan |
R.R. and others v Hungary (application no. 36037/17)
The case concerned the applicants’ confinement in the Röszke transit zone on the border with Serbia in April-August 2017. The Court found, in particular, that the lack of food provided to R.R. and the conditions of stay of the other applicants (a pregnant woman and children) had led to a violation of Article 3. It also found that that the applicants’ stay in the transit zone had amounted to a de facto deprivation of liberty and that the absence of any formal decision of the authorities and any proceedings by which the lawfulness of their detention could have been decided speedily by a court had led to violations of Article 5. 2 March 2021 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Topic(s): Immigration Detention | Countries: Hungary |
Commission v Hungary (Accueil des demandeurs de protection internationale) C-808/18
Hungary has failed to fulfil its obligations: – in providing that applications for international protection from third-country nationals or stateless persons who, arriving from Serbia, wish to access, in its territory, the international protection procedure, may be made only in the transit zones of Röszke and Tompa, while adopting a consistent and generalised administrative practice drastically limiting the number of applicants authorised to enter those transit zones daily; – in establishing a system of systematic detention of applicants for international protection in the transit zones of Röszke and Tompa, without observing the guarantees provided for in Article 24(3) and Article 43 of Directive 2013/32 and Articles 8, 9 and 11 of Directive 2013/33; – in allowing the removal of all third-country nationals staying illegally in its territory, with the exception of those of them who are suspected of having committed a criminal offence, without observing the procedures and safeguards laid down in Article 5, Article 6(1), Article 12(1) and Article 13(1) of Directive 2008/115; – in making the exercise by applicants for international protection who fall within the scope of Article 46(5) of Directive 2013/32 of their right to remain in its territory subject to conditions contrary to EU law. 17 December 2020 | Judicial Body: European Union: Court of Justice of the European Union | Document type: Case Law | Topic(s): Access to procedures - Illegal entry - Immigration Detention | Countries: Hungary |
UNHCR observations
on legislative amendments related to exclusion from and revocation of refugee status and subsidiary protection status
December 2020 | Publisher: UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) | Document type: Comments on National Legislation |
Written observations by the Office of the
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in the case of
A.H. v National Directorate-General/or Aliens Policing (11.K.706.750/2020)
before the Budapest Capital Regional Court
25 November 2020 | Publisher: UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) | Document type: Court Interventions / Amicus Curiae |
CASE OF RANA v. HUNGARY (Application no. 40888/17)
The case concerned a transgender man from Iran who had obtained asylum in Hungary but could not legally change his gender and name in that country. The Court noted that the domestic system for gender recognition had excluded the applicant simply because he did not have a birth certificate from Hungary, a change in the birth register being the way name and gender changes were legally recognised. The Court concluded that a fair balance had not been struck between the public interest and the applicant’s right to respect for his private life owing to the refusal to give him access to the legal gender recognition procedure. 16 July 2020 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): Birth Certificates - Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) - Persecution on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity - Right to family life | Countries: Hungary - Iran, Islamic Republic of |
UNHCR Position on Hungarian Act LVIII of 2020 on the Transitional Rules and Epidemiological Preparedness related to the Cessation of the State of Danger
June 2020 | Publisher: UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) | Document type: Comments on National Legislation |
Commission v Poland (Mécanisme temporaire de relocalisation de demandeurs de protection internationale) (C‑715/17, C‑718/17 and C‑719/17)
Commission sought a declaration from the Court that, by failing to indicate at regular intervals, and at least every three months, an appropriate number of applicants for international protection who could be relocated swiftly to its territory, the republic of Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic failed to fulfil its obligations 2 April 2020 | Judicial Body: European Union: Court of Justice of the European Union | Document type: Case Law | Topic(s): Admission quotas - Burden-sharing and international co-operation - Resettlement | Countries: Czech Republic - Greece - Hungary - Italy - Poland |
CASE OF ILIAS AND AHMED v. HUNGARY (Application no. 47287/15) (Grand Chamber)
The Court found in particular that the Hungarian authorities had failed in their duty under Article 3 to assess the risks of the applicants not having proper access to asylum proceedings in Serbia or being subjected to chain-refoulement, which could have seen them being sent to Greece, where conditions in refugee camps had already been found to be in violation of Article 3. In a development of its case-law, it held that Article 5 was not applicable to the applicants’ case as there had been no de facto deprivation of liberty in the transit zone. Among other things, the Court found that the applicants had entered the transit zone of their own initiative and it had been possible in practice for them to return to Serbia, where they had not faced any danger to their life or health. Their fears of a lack of access to Serbia’s asylum system or of refoulement to Greece, as expressed under Article 3, had not been enough to make their stay in the transit zone involuntary. 21 November 2019 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Topic(s): Expulsion - Freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment - Rejection at border - Right to liberty and security - Safe third country - Transit | Countries: Bangladesh - Greece - Hungary - North Macedonia - Serbia - Turkey |
CASE OF SZUROVECZ v. HUNGARY (Application no. 15428/16)
The case concerned media access to reception facilities for asylum-seekers. The applicant in the case, a journalist for an Internet news portal, complained about the authorities’ refusal of his request to carry out interviews and take photographs at the Debrecen Reception Centre, thus preventing him from reporting on the living conditions there. The Court stressed that research work was an essential part of press freedom and had to be protected. It was not convinced that restricting the applicant’s ability to carry out such research work, which had prevented him from reporting first-hand on a matter of considerable public interest, namely the refugee crisis in Hungary, had been sufficiently justified. In particular, the authorities had only given summary reasons, namely possible problems for the safety and private lives of asylum-seekers, for their refusal, without any real weighing up of the interests at stake. 8 October 2019 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): Freedom of expression | Countries: Hungary |