By Busra Akın Dincer
LONDON
The Hungarian government led by Prime Minister Viktor Orban has been under the spotlight recently over its controversial approach to migration during the last year.
Hungary will hold a referendum on Sunday over European Union refugee quotas. The referendum is widely seen as the second anti-EU vote after June’s seismic decision by British voters to leave the bloc.
Sunday’s referendum will ask Hungarians: “Do you want the European Union to be able to mandate the obligatory resettlement of non-Hungarian citizens into Hungary even without the approval of the National Assembly?”
Marta Pardavi, co-chair of the Hungarian Helsinki Committee (HHC), a leading human rights watchdog, told Anadolu Agency question was “ambiguous”.
“The impact of this referendum, legally speaking, is unclear because the question itself is completely ambiguous.
“It does not give any guidance to what the Hungarian parliament should enact as legislation. From a legal perspective, the question is completely misleading. It should not have been allowed,” Pardavi said.
Although the question is accused of being unclear, it is anticipated a majority will be voting “no”, in support of the government’s position.
A recent survey conducted by a Hungarian think tank, the Szazadveg Foundation, found that 78 percent of respondents would vote “no” on Oct. 2.
According to Pardavi, the reason behind this is the Hungarian government’s “racist” campaign over the last year.
“Public opinion has changed to believe that refugees and migrants are bringing with them danger to our security, danger to our Christian heritage and identity, something that I don’t think an average Hungarian was really concerned with before,” she said and added:
“It was a very peripheral issue, migration and asylum in Hungary previously. But all of a sudden it became the number-one issue.”
Pardavi said anti-migrant messaging and communication started in early 2015: "It was much more focused on shifting domestic public opinion away from certain sensitive issues existing in Hungarian domestic politics."
Hungary and other right-wing populist governments in Slovakia and Poland have raised objections to the relocation of Muslim refugees from Italy, Greece or Turkey, and proposed instead taking in a limited number of Christian refugees.
“As human rights organizations, we are receiving an increasing number of incidents about anti-Muslim hate speech in Hungary," Pardavi said and added:
"In addition to verbal abuse, there are also instances of physical abuse. There are certain indications that things are happening which Muslims living in Hungary have not been experiencing previously."
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said this week EU member states should provide shelter for refugees fleeing terror and civil war, irrespective of their religion or faith.
However, Prime Minister Orban has caused tension within the EU and around the world with his hardline stance on asylum seekers.
Last week Orban argued that large camps should be set up outside the EU “on an island or North Africa,” and those who came illegally must be “rounded up and shipped out”.
Speaking at a summit of EU leaders in Vienna on Saturday, Orban said a “giant refugee city” should be built on the Libyan coast to process asylum claims before they reach Europe.
Following Orban’s speech, the Libyan Foreign Ministry described his call as a “violation to Libya’s sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence”.
Director of the International Human Rights Clinic at Boston University, Professor Susan Akram, told Anadolu Agency the Hungarian government had been “undermining the entire legal framework of European cooperation.”
“Unfortunately, the Hungarian prime minister's comments fly in the face of Hungary's binding, pre-existing legal obligations under both international and European law,” she said and added:
“The essential elements of the 1951 Refugee Convention, to which all European states are bound, whether directly or through the EU Charter, [are] obligatory on all EU member states.
“The EU Charter and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights together reinforce the prohibition against collective expulsion and define non-refoulement (not to return a refugee to a place where s/he risks persecution) as removal to a risk not only to persecution, but also to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment.”
According to Professor Akram such fundamental violations of European-wide legal obligations challenge the underpinnings of Europe “as a region based on the rule of law”.
“It is undoubtedly these legal considerations that have compelled other European countries to threaten litigation against Hungary for its call to round up refugees and detain them on an island or somewhere ‘in North Africa’ and to suggest Hungary's suspension from the EU,” Professor Akram said and continued:
“If Hungary takes unilateral action that undermines core rights guarantees, the entire legal framework of European cooperation towards the entry of migrants and refugees will be called into question.”
Despite an agreement reached by the EU Council last year to relocate 160,000 refugees from Italy and Greece, EU member states have so far relocated only 5,000 people.
Hungary was given 1,294 refugees to relocate under the quota system; however the country has decided to challenge the plan by taking it to the European Court of Justice.
"The Hungarian government was able to use this referendum as a campaign and a popular sentiment to turn against furthering European integration," Pardavi stated added:
"The sentiment that has been built up to this very expensive and racist campaign will stay in Hungary for a very long time."
