Hungary anti-asylum bill broke EU law, says top court

Hungary broke EU law by forcing asylum seekers to present themselves at its embassies in Serbia or Ukraine, the EU’s top court ruled on Thursday (22 June).

The judgement by the European Court of Justice found that a law introduced by the Hungarian government during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 “deprives the third-country nationals or stateless persons concerned of the effective enjoyment of their right to seek asylum from Hungary”.

The legislation required asylum seekers in Hungary or arriving at its border to travel to the Hungarian embassy in Kyiv or Belgrade to request permission to lodge an asylum claim.

The Hungarian authorities would then decide whether to grant an officials travel document enabling the individual to travel. Only 44 people applied for international protection in Hungary in 2022 due to the law.

The Viktor Orban government, which has consistently taken a tough line of preventing migrants and asylum seekers since the 2015 Syrian refugee crisis, had sought to justify the law because it would help prevent the spread of COVID-19. However, in its judgement, the Luxembourg-based court found that the measure “cannot be regarded as a measure suitable for combating the spread of the pandemic.”

International and EU law gives people seeking international protection the right to claim asylum in any country if they fear for their safety or would face persecution or discrimination in their home state.

The effect of the law was to deny “effective, easy and rapid access to the procedure for granting international protection,” the court stated, adding that it had “unduly hindered the possibility of making an asylum application.”

The case was brought against Orban’s government by the European Commission, which will now decide whether to demand that Hungary scrap the law or levy fines.

“We regret that the Court has made such a decision, but we also regret that the European Commission and the Court of Justice of the European Union have forced us to create this legislation in the first place,” said Gergely Gulyás, the minister of the Prime Minister’s Office, following the ruling.

Earlier this month, Hungary and Poland were the two countries to vote against an agreement struck by EU home affairs ministers to reform the bloc’s immigration and asylum rules that would require member states that refuse to relocate migrants to pay a levy of €20,000 per person.

[Edited by Alice Taylor]