Hungary should not allow security concerns to override the human rights of migrants, a U.N. migration expert said Wednesday.
Felipe Gonzalez Morales, the U.N. special rapporteur on migrant rights, said that Hungarian authorities should move families with children who are awaiting a ruling on their asylum applications from being detained in border transit zones to being placed in open reception centers.
Speaking at the end of an eight-day visit to Hungary, Gonzalez Morales also expressed concerns about Hungary's restrictive asylum procedures and urged Prime Minister Viktor Orban's government to end the migrant "crisis situation" it declared in 2016 because the flow of migrants has decreased greatly since then.
"The current situation is a completely different one than the one that existed four years ago," he told reporters. "Security concerns, that are legitimate but which cannot override human rights, should be adapted to reality."
Hungary built razor-wire fences on its southern borders in late 2015, the peak of the migrant crisis and when some 400,000 people passed through the country on their way to Western Europe. Orban has made migration the central issue of his government since 2015 and says that it will remain the most important question in Europe for decades to come. Orban is especially opposed by immigration by Muslims and says Hungary and Europe need to protect their Christian culture.
Tamas Menczer of the Foreign Ministry, said in a video posted on Facebook that migration "is not a resolved issue" and remains a security risk.
Migration is "not a problem we have left behind, rather, migration is the problem," Menczer said in reply to the U.N. expert's comments. "The fence will stay where it is as it serves the security of the Hungarian people."
Gonzalez Morales was also critical of the "politicization of the issue of migration" in Hungary, including "xenophobic discourse" from government officials that he said has "scapegoated migrants" and led to the discrimination of non-white Hungarians as well.
He also panned laws adopted last year targeting civic groups helping asylum-seekers.
"The fact that certain behaviors that have been historically considered legitimate in democratic systems could end in criminal prosecution affects the way civil society can work freely and defend the human rights of the migrants and asylum-seekers," Gonzalez Morales said.
WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk expressed satisfaction on Monday after a series of candidates supported by his party won weekend races for mayor.
Candidates from his pro-European Union centrist Civic Coalition, or running with the party's backing, won in a series of cities in the second round of local elections held on Sunday, among them Krakow, Poznan, Wroclaw and Rzeszow.
“It is very difficult to clearly say who won and who lost,” Tusk said Monday. “But if we compare these results, especially in the most attractive places, on these attractive battlefields ... then I actually have reasons for satisfaction.”
“Law and Justice has simply disappeared in many places,” Tusk added at a news conference, referring to the main opposition party.
The results put Civic Coalition in a favorable position as the country looks next to elections to the European Parliament on June 9.
Mayors were chosen in a total of 748 cities and towns where no single candidate won at least 50% of the vote during the first round on April 7.
Candidates for Tusk’s party also recaptured cities where they had not held power for many years, including Zielona Gora, Legnica and Torun.
The local and regional elections were viewed as a test for Tusk's pro-European Union government four months after it took power at the national level. Sunday's second round strengthened the Tusk government's leverage in the cities, which should facilitate cooperation on development projects and allotment of EU funds.
Tusk's allies also won in some places in the first round two weeks ago, including in Warsaw, where incumbent Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski was an easy victor.
In the first round, the right-wing Law and Justice, prevailed on the level of regional assemblies in the country's 16 provinces, where it took 34.3% of the votes, while Tusk's Civic Coalition got 30.6%. Law and Justice governed on the national level from 2015-23.
Tusk’s socially liberal Civic Coalition traditionally has strong support in cities, while Law and Justice has a more solid base in conservative rural areas, particularly in eastern Poland.
Civic Coalition is the largest group in a three-party coalition that governs the EU nation of 38 million people. The coalition is pro-European Union but otherwise spans a wide ideological spectrum with left-wing politicians in the Left party as well as conservatives in the Third Way.
Polish voters take part in a local runoff election in Lomianki, near Warsaw, Poland on Sunday, April 21, 2024. Voters are choosing mayors who did not win outright in the first round of the election two weeks earlier. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)
Campaign posters promote candidates as Poles vote in local and regional elections in Lomianki, near Warsaw, Poland on Sunday, April 21, 2024. Voters are choosing mayors who did not win outright in the first round of the election two weeks earlier. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)
Polish voters take part in a local runoff election in Lomianki, near Warsaw, Poland on Sunday, April 21, 2024. Voters are choosing mayors who did not win outright in the first round of the election two weeks earlier. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)
Polish voters take part in a local runoff election in Lomianki, near Warsaw, Poland on Sunday, April 21, 2024. Voters are choosing mayors who did not win outright in the first round of the election two weeks earlier. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)
FILE - Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk reacts during his and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy meeting with students in Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, Jan. 22, 2024. Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk is celebrating a victory on Monday April 22, 2024 after a series of candidates supported by his party won weekend races for mayor. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky, File)
FILE - Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk listens to the media in Berlin, Germany, Friday, March 15, 2024. Tusk is celebrating a victory on Monday April 22, 2024 after a series of candidates supported by his party won weekend races for mayor. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi, File)
