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Candle light memorial for the victims of Fortress Europe

30/8/2015

We MigSzol, the Migrant Solidarity Group of Hungary, invited everybody tonight to share a moment of silence for those who died this week - over 70 people who were seeking protection suffocated in a truck of a smuggler on the border of Hungary and Austria. This is a tragedy, it is unacceptable.

A European guideline called The Dublin III regulation states that people who seek protection have to do it in the first Schengen country they enter. (read: Jobbik agrees with MigSzol? (No, not really.)) It is because of this that people cannot rely on legal ways of moving further inside Europe, like boarding the trains from this train station, and because of this that people seeking protection have to rely on dangerous routes and human smugglers. It is hard to believe that this is what Europe turned to be in the 21st century.

In the light of these events it is more important than ever that each of us takes the steps to come here and work together for humane and equal rights for everybody. Tonight, let us share the silence to bear together with all the families that suffer and have lost their siblings, relatives or friends.

Tonight (2015.08.28) is for remembering all the victims of Fortress Europe. Thank you for coming.

2015.08.28 - Event page
Gyertyás megemlékezés az európai erőd áldozataira
Candle light memorial for the victims of Fortress Europe
https://www.facebook.com/events/1716459195248719/

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Let them board the trains!

27/8/2015

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Thursday, 27th August, 20-50 people were found dead in a lorry that was parked in Austria, near the Hungarian border. It is highly likely that these people were not allowed to board the trains to Austria after diligent ethnic profiling by the Hungarian police. The profiling, of course, focuses on who looks like a “migrant”, or a “refugee”.

For those people in Hungary who have spent the last months helping others on different transit zones this tragedy comes as a cruel reminder that the Dublin regulation results in death. For us, these are not faceless people whom we don’t have to care about because we have not met them. Hundreds of volunteers in Hungary have spoken with teenagers, men, women, grandpas, grandpas and children who were kicked out of the Vienna-bound trains. We have tried to get refunds for their train tickets, we have helped them in looking for lost siblings and children, we have recorded rights violations. Now the volunteers and members of different groups from Migration Aid to Migszol and others can only wonder - how many people do we know among those who are dead?

With this short commentary we want to raise a broader concern: will this tragedy again result in more intense hunting of smugglers, or will there finally be a move from authorities’ towards admitting that the Dublin Regulation kills people? As long as we keep on sanctifying the Dublin Regulations and keeping people off trains, smugglers will unfortunately not only be needed but also making a lot of money. For us, in Hungary, it is a reminder that helping people is not enough: what we need is a safe passage through our country, and for that, we need to fight the European legislation.

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Jobbik agrees with MigSzol? (No, not really.)

25/8/2015

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UPDATE: Since the writing of this article it has been reported that the German state has suspended Dublin deportations of Syrian refugees, even if they have their fingerprints and asylum claims in countries like Hungary. This is a great victory for the rights of refugees in Europe. This also begs the question of why Syrians are now ‘privileged’ in this absurd system but not Afghans, Iraqis, Somalis and others fleeing brutal wars?

Jobbik recently called on the Fidesz Party-led Hungarian govt to suspend the EU’s Dublin III Regulation. MigSzol has been demanding Hungary withdraw from ‘Dublin’ for a long time.

'That's why we demand the government to suspend the Dublin III Regulations until the western powers/authorities - lead by the USA - won't finance the costs poured on our country and take part in our border protection...'
— Jobbik.hu, (2015.08.06) (also, english article from Hungary Today)

Perhaps this is an example of how politics can be strangely circular, but MigSzol has been speaking against Dublin since our founding in 2012 (english / magyarul). Our reasons for opposing the Dublin system are quite different however:

• No to the Dublin deportation machine, No to racist police controls within Schengen region of Europe and No to the European Frontex system of ‘Fortress Europe’. and,
• Yes! to a future Hungary and Europe where we are not defined by our papers and national origins.
— MigSzol 21 March 2015 Statement: World Anti-Racism/Anti-Xenophobia Day

A little bit of history

The Dublin Regulation* was agreed upon and signed in 1990 and first came into force in 1997 — long before Hungary and most other countries would join the European Union. While it’s announced purpose was to prevent refugees from requesting asylum in multiple European states, Dublin’s effect today is to prevent ‘swarms’ of migrants from reaching Europe’s “core” (western and northern countries) by attempting to keep them in the periphery (southern and eastern Europe).

Earlier this summer the Hungarian government briefly implied that it had suspended Dublin, but this seemed to be a bargaining chip with German and other EU states to prevent Hungary being included in a failed proposal that would distribute refugees around the EU. This had the unintended effect that some refugees thought they would not be fingerprinted if they come to Hungary.

The Great EU System Crash of 2015

The original idea was that the first country a refugee enters should be the country that people request asylum in. Consequently, ‘asylum shopping’ in other European states would be impossible because Dublin is supported by a vast Europe-wide database of fingerprints of asylum seekers (see: EURODAC). When these asylum seekers would be found in a country other than the first country they entered, they would be quickly deported back to the country that has their fingerprints. Like many EU solutions, it made sense on paper.

In the summer of 2015 this European system has crashed as one million are predicted to arrive in Europe by land, sea and air. According to Amnesty International, most of the people who took the Balkan route and who were caught in Hungary have already moved further west.

In theory, these 130,000+ people who were fingerprinted by Hungarian police so far this year will be caught again in another EU country and promptly deported back to Hungary to complete their asylum claims.

Also during this time the ‘borderless’ Schengen zone, often considered to be the highest achievement of the EU, became a massive profiling zone for the ‘harmonized’ European police forces to look for suspect people whose skin was too dark or perhaps were just dressed too muslim-like while travelling.

The Dublin system did not work well before, and it certainly cannot work after this summer’s crisis. In the first half of 2015 alone, only 718 people were deported - or “returned” in EuroSpeak - to Hungary from other EU countries. It is very likely that most of these ‘returnees’ quickly left Hungary and went back to whatever country they were deported from. In reality, this means that people and families are not settling down nor are they integrating into a new European life. Instead they are living precarious, underground and illegal lives in Europe — and, this is all preventable.

United Nations: Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 13
(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.
(2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.

Here is the reality

Very few refugees and asylum seekers wish to stay in Hungary - this is thanks to an almost non-existent integration policy. Today, refugees are no longer even entitled to Hungarian language education and there are few economic and educational opportunities available to make a life here.

Dublin is a cruel system that prevents desperate people and families from properly settling or integrating into european countries and it pushes them into vulnerable situations, including exploitation and poverty — Europe’s politicians from stronger and dominant countries know this, and wish to continue with this status quo.

Dublin is a machine that dumps human beings ‘undesirable’ to northern and western Europe onto the outer peripheries of Europe — and offers little for those countries to help integrate refugees in countries like Hungary.

What is more, Dublin tears families apart as it prevents people from joining their family members in other countries, like the Syrian 17-year old boy we met at Budapest’s Keleti train station last week, who wants to live with his uncle in Bremen, Germany.

There is some money available from the Europe Union, but it never matches the need and planned future funds are already insufficient for this summer’s growing crisis. Recently Hungarian NGOs receiving some of this money through the Hungarian state had to lay off workers for a lack of adequate funding and cancel essential services for refugees.

And, of course, the EU offers a lot of money for “security” and “prevention”, thus further criminalising migrants instead of helping families in need of a new life in Europe. At Migszol, we believe that this is the time to revisit the values of Europe, our values as European citizens, and not hold the EU legislation as a moral authority.

Effectively, the Dublin Regulation is now creating a new generation of future Europeans who are marginalised, excluded and criminalised by the Hungarian state at the very start of their new lives in Europe. This is a planned tragedy in the making, engineered by the European Union.

2015.08 Image: Hungarian government’s 2nd wave of street propaganda poster campaign
‘The Young Woman says: ‘We do not want illegal immigrants’ and,
Poster: Hungarian reforms are working’

Bulgaria and Greece

Hungary should not take part in this brutal deportation machine - it should neither receive deportees nor deport people to “safe countries” like Bulgaria and Serbia. Few know that because of Dublin, refugees with fingerprints in Bulgaria have already been deported from Hungary. And the conditions in Bulgarian refugee camps are much worse than in Hungary.

Perhaps 90% of the asylum seekers in Hungary have passed through Greece - which is an EU country and a signatory to the Dublin Regulation. Greece is, undisputed by all, a disaster for the Greek people these days — and therefore even worse for refugees. Because of this, no EU state deports asylum seekers to Greece anymore. Shockingly, the Hungarian state now stands alone in the EU as claiming that Greece is a safe country for refugees. This opens the door to possible future deportations from Hungary to Greece.

Erase the fingerprints and Protect freedom of movement

Considering that there are few real possibilities for work and education for the 130,000+ refugees that have requested asylum and left their fingerprints in Hungary so far this year, and considering that the Hungarian state is deliberate inciting fear and hatred towards them — why deport these people back to Hungary?

MigSzol believes in free movement and that migration is as natural as humanity itself – and because many of the refugees are fleeing war and oppression we have a special responsibility to help.

A protestors sign from Refugee Protest Camp Vienna’s August 2013 demonstration
at the Austrian-Hungarian border — article (German) and more photos.

We know that Hungary can lend a hand to those in need because the Hungarian people already have done so. This summer’s “migrant crisis” has resulted in an amazing burst of charity and activism which blossomed across the country to help the refugees travelling north from Serbia.

These grassroots efforts only prove that Hungary does have a generous heart — in spite of Jobbik and the Fidesz Party-led Hungarian government.

It may appear that Jobbik agrees with MigSzol but the reality is different — unlike them we are actually sad that this summer’s ‘flood’ of refugees will not settle and add to the life, economy and culture of Hungary. Unfortunately, in the future, many will be deported back to Hungary and this will not be by their own choice.

* Ironically, the Republic of Ireland is not part of the Dublin system, even though this EU agreement was first signed there.

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The Scapegoats of Keleti

23/8/2015

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The Keleti train station never fails to surprise. After 9 pm on Saturday night a train to Munich was stuck at the station for several hours - why? Because 200 Afghan people had been removed from the train, but refused to leave the platform and sat down to the ground. The police isolated the platform and were negotiating with the group for hours, letting the train leave four hours late from its schedule. The group was then taken inside for an official check, ensuring that all of them would be fingerprinted in Hungary.

The scene was complete with a massive mobile prison vehicle, almost ten police cars and herds of police men surrounding the sitting group. Fellow train travellers were obviously extremely irritated by the delay caused by “the migrants, of course” and the atmosphere varied from tense to nervous. Looking from afar, this group surrounded by policemen and anxious translators certainly looked like they had committed a crime of some sort.

What you couldn’t see from distance was that the group of people surrounded by police consisted of families, sleeping kids and young men who have been travelling in precarious situation for days and weeks to reach this point. Their act of civil disobedience, sitting down to the platform, was the one peaceful and beautiful thing they could do to demand their right to asylum in a safe country. They did nothing illegal by staying at the platform, regardless of how it looks like from behind the police line.

Once treated like criminals enough, these people become a very handy scapegoat for a train delay, a dirty park, or a crumbling European unity. It’s too bad that this perspective fails to see the story from inside the police blockade.

Photo: Attila Stefán

PS. MÁV does not refund train tickets anymore after the train has left. When hundreds of people are prevented from boarding their trains on weekly basis, the train companies must make nice profit from these long distance tickets that will never be used.

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MigSzol School Picnic: Henna Hands at Margitsziget!

12/8/2015

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MigSzol started the MigSzol Iskola (school) last February to teach free beginner level Hungarian language classes. We did this to prove that migrants in Hungary actually do wish to join Hungarian life and culture, and learn the Hungarian language — contrary to what many Hungarian politicians may wish us to believe.

After our successful semester ended earlier this summer, but recently many students met again this weekend for a picnic at Budapest’s Margitsziget park.

The next beginners classes will be announced soon for this autumn! If interested, please send an email: [email protected]

Photo: Henna tattoos painted by an Indian and Pakistani on the hands of Vietnamese, Hungarian and Russian women — at Margitsziget! (2015.08.09)

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Candle light memorial for the victims of Fortress Europe

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Photos....

Let them board the trains!

Jobbik agrees with MigSzol? (No, not really.)

The Scapegoats of Keleti

MigSzol School Picnic: Henna Hands at Margitsziget!

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Contact us

Migrant Solidarity Group

Candle light memorial for the victims of Fortress Europe

Video...

Photos....

Let them board the trains!

Jobbik agrees with MigSzol? (No, not really.)

The Scapegoats of Keleti

MigSzol School Picnic: Henna Hands at Margitsziget﻿!

Author

Archives

Categories

Contact us

﻿Migrant Solidarity Group﻿

MigSzol School Picnic: Henna Hands at Margitsziget!

Migrant Solidarity Group