Sweden is planning to take legal action if Hungary refuses to observe Dublin regulations and take back asylum-seekers first registered by Hungarian authorities after entering European Union territory, the country’s minister for justice and migration-related issues has said.
Morgan Johansson told a Swedish radio station that during the week, his government has received a letter from Dimitris Avramopoulos, the EU Commissioner for Migration, which details that Hungary is obliged to observe Dublin regulations and process asylum applications handed in by migrants first registered in Hungary who later travelled on to other member states. Stockholm is ready to initiate proceedings against Hungary at the European Court of Justice (ECJ) to force Hungary to comply with its obligations, Mr. Johansson said.
This is not the first time the left-wing Swedish minister has criticised Hungary for refusing to take back asylum-seekers registered in Hungary (photo: government.se)
Recently, five Nordic countries – Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden – penned a letter to the European Commission, in which the group requested the EU body to take measures to ensure that Hungary observes the community’s set of rules on the process of granting asylum known as the Dublin regulations.
Around 1000 migrants registered in Hungary as asylum-seekers are currently in Sweden, according to the Swedish immigration authority. Hungary argues that these individuals entered EU territory not in Hungary but upon their arrival to Greece; however, several court rulings have come to the conclusion that asylum-seekers cannot be sent back to Greece because of the “inhumane and humiliating” conditions they would face there.
In mid-August, Sweden summoned Hungary’s ambassador to Stockholm over the country’s refusal to take back migrants from Sweden. In response, Hungarian foreign minister Péter Szijjártó branded the criticism, also voiced by Mr. Johansson, “strange and unacceptable”. Mr. Szijjártó said at the time that the Hungarian government’s position concerning taking back illegal migrants remains unchanged. “We will only take back those migrants who first entered the European Union through Hungary,” the leader of the Hungarian diplomatic service insisted.
via mandiner.hu
photo: theduran.com