Ungheria. Immigrazione illegale ritorna ad essere penalmente perseguibile.

Giuseppe Sandro Mela.

2018-06-02.

Dal 1° giugno di questo anno l’immigrazione illegale è tornata ad essere reato in Ungheria.

Assieme a quanti fossero entrati illegalmente nel paese, saranno considerati complici quanti li avessero aiutati.

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Il problema non è la “immigrazione”, bensì quella “illegale”: è la illegalità la materia che la nuova legge fa ritornare nel codice penale, dopo lunga latenza.

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Ovviamente, tutti coloro, persone fisiche ovvero persone giuridiche, che ci lucravano sopra sono insorti come un sol uomo, indicando tale provvedimento con tutto il consueto repertorio di epiteti.

Riportiamo a seguito due articoli editi da giornali liberal. Valuterà quindi il lettore.

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→ Euronews. 2018-05-31. Hungary’s ‘Stop Soros’ bill seeks to criminalise migrant helpers, Euronews

On Tuesday, Viktor Orban’s ruling Fidesz submitted to Parliament a bill ridiculously titled “Stop Soros.” This bill has nothing to do with George Soros and it has absolutely nothing to do with human trafficking. The bill is about incarcerating Hungarians who are deemed to have assisted illegal migration in any way whatsoever. Hungarians who simply see a man, woman or child in need and give him or her food, clothing or temporary lodging could face prison, if the person they helped turns out to have entered Hungary illegally.

The legislation is part of the right-wing Prime Minister Viktor Orbán government’s campaign against George Soros- a Hungarian-born billionaire financier and philanthropist. Orbán’s government has vilified Soros the past year as the main backer of illegal migration to Europe.
“Those who provide financial means . . . or conduct this organisational activity on a regular basis will be punishable with up to one year in prison,” said the official text of the proposals.
Meaning that anyone who gives a migrant a sandwich, blanket, or even a bottle of water could end up behind bars.
“We need an action plan to defend Hungary and this is the Stop Soros package of Bills,” the interior ministry added in a comment.
In contrast to earlier versions, the latest draft of the Bill, submitted to parliament on Tuesday, does not propose compulsory security checks for NGOs that work with migrants or a 25 percent tax on their foreign funding.
The constitution would also be amended to stop other EU countries from transferring asylum seekers to Hungary, which rejects European Union quotas to distribute migrants around the bloc.
The Hungarian Helsinki Committee, who provides legal aid to asylum-seekers, called for the draft law to be dropped and said it threatens to bring back “an era of fear, unheard of since the fall of (the) communist dictatorship.”
The United Nations Refugee Agency has urged Hungary to scrap the proposals and said it is “seriously concerned” about it in a statement.
“Seeking asylum is a fundamental human right, it is not a crime . . . We are particularly concerned that the government is targeting those who, in a purely humanitarian role, help people who are seeking asylum,” added Pascale Moreau, director of the UNHCR’s Europe bureau.
The legislation was a key promise of Orbán’s party Fidesz. It comes a month after he and the party were reelected with a two-thirds majority. It means the bill, which is expected to be voted next week, can be passed without hitches.
On Wednesday Máté Kocsis, Fidesz’s faction leader said in parliament: “The citizens participating at the elections clearly and squarely stated their opinion on not wanting Hungary to become a migrant country.”
“Unlike the previous proposal, the novelty in it is that it also uses criminal law instruments, which makes it much stricter than the previous proposal,” he added.
Since Orbán came to power in 2010, he has increased control over the media and fearlessly campaigned an anti-migrant sentiment.
It included sealing the country’s border with fences in 2015 to stop refugees from entering at the height of the migration crisis. It has put Orbán at odds with the European Union who funds the country with billions of euros a year.
Speaking at the European Council on Foreign Relations in Paris on Tuesday, George Soros said: “The whole of Europe has been disrupted by the refugee crisis. Unscrupulous leaders have exploited it even in countries that have accepted hardly any refugees.”
“In Hungary, Victor Orbán based his re-election campaign on falsely accusing me of planning to flood Europe, Hungary included, with Muslim refugees,” he added
The Orbán government’s most odious trespass was never its attack against independent media, its insipid corruption or its deconstruction of checks and balances, but rather the way that it has worked to strip Hungarian society of its humanity.

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→ Hungarian Free Press. 2018-05-31. Prison awaits Hungarians who help refugees

We have been here before. Fidesz crosses what appears to be that proverbial line in the sand. Hungarian civil society protests. Hungarian columnists express outrage. A handful of European Union politicians demand a firm response from the EU and, in particular, disciplinary action from the European People’s Party, of which Fidesz is a member. And then the voices of protest and calls for action subside, most everything moves ahead as Mr. Orbán planned, as he sets his eyes on the next line in the sand to be crossed. And then we go through this same cycle again, and again and again.

On Tuesday, Fidesz submitted to Parliament a bill ridiculously titled “Stop Soros.” As György Balavány writes in one of the best opinion pieces on the subject: this bill has nothing to do with George Soros and it has absolutely nothing to do with human trafficking. The bill is about incarcerating Hungarians who are deemed to have assisted illegal migration in any way whatsoever. Hungarians who simply see a man, woman or child in need and give him or her food, clothing or temporary lodging could face prison, if the person they helped turns out to have entered Hungary illegally. When someone is in crisis, civilized people in a civilized society step up to help. They do not first ask the individual to produce paperwork as to his or her legal status. The Orbán government’s most odious trespass was never its attack against independent media, its insipid corruption or its deconstruction of checks and balances, but rather the way that it has worked to strip Hungarian society of its humanity.

As Mr. Balavány writes, “this law not only contravenes the spirit of the Geneva Convention, which even grants rights to refugees who are in the country without a permit, but it also contravenes all that western civilization, based on Judeo-Christian traditions, considers to be normal and decent.”

Having an enemy that Hungarians can despise with cult-like fury, someone to serve as a target for the most lurid vitriol and occasionally physical violence, serves as the underpinning of the Orbán regime. In stark contrast to communist ruler János Kádár, Mr. Orbán is unable to usher in a period of “peaceful”  consolidation–even after more than eight consecutive years in power and with the security of a two-thirds majority, not to mention the thoroughly decimated opposition.

Mr. Soros and migrants can only be used a boogeymen for so long. Mr. Orbán needs new enemies–and these will now be fellow Hungarians. As Mr. Balavány notes: “If you hide, feed or care for refugees in any way, or if you are “pro-migrant,” you are an enemy of the homeland and the full force of the law will be used against you. If you demonstrate humanity, if you help the persecuted, the henchmen of the regime will come for you. Such a horrid law has never before been born in 21st century Hungary, but there were examples of this in 20th century Hungarian history.”

That said, Fidesz did remove a few of the most problematic elements from the original proposal. For instance, the original bill would have required any NGO working with refugees first receive approval from the Interior Ministry. This has been scrapped. But other elements of the legislation are equally draconian. For example, offering the most basic level of aid to an illegal migrant can land you in jail for between 50 day to 90 days. Aiding migrants within an 8 km zone of the international border can lead to imprisonment for a full year. Fidesz added that even producing pamphlets or other printed material and providing these to refugees or migrants can result in a jail or prison sentence.

The Hungarian opposition parties have no ability to halt the Stop Soros bill before parliament. Fidesz has a two-thirds majority in the legislature. At this point, only the European People’s Party has the ability to apply pressure. Thus far, they have been mostly unwilling to do so.

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→ Hungary Journal. 2018-05-31. Govt submits “Stop Soros”

The Orban government submits the “Stop Soros” legislative package and the seventh amendment of the constitution.

Hungary is ready for debates about its “Stop Soros” package of bills, a senior government official said on Tuesday, noting that the government was preparing to submit the package to parliament.

The “Stop Soros” package criminalises the organisation of illegal migration, making it punishable by imprisonment. In the debates about the bill, the Hungarian government will consistently prioritise the country’s security interests, Csaba Domotor, the state secretary of the Cabinet Office, told a press conference. Domotor said the bill reflected the result of last month’s general election, arguing that on April 8, Hungarians had voted to protect Hungary from illegal migration.

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Justice minister: Govt to submit constitutional amendments today

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The justice minister has said the government will submit the seventh amendment to the constitution on Tuesday. The changes will affect ten articles covering three areas.

Laszlo Trocsanyi told MTI on Tuesday that some of the provisions had been debated in parliament in the autumn of 2016 but the opposition had withheld its support, denying the government the two-thirds needed for approval of the changes. Now the government has the necessary supermajority.

The first issue concerns protecting Hungary’s constitutional identity and the issue of asylum. Europe and Hungary, he said, face new challenges that justify “strengthening our national sovereignty”. State bodies, in accordance with Constitutional Court decisions, will be obliged to protect the country’s constitutional identity, he said.

In a European Union context, the exercise of fundamental rights and freedoms should fall in line with Hungary’s constitution, the minister said. Accordingly, no restrictions may be placed on Hungary’s rights in connection with its territorial unity, population or the form and structure of the state.

In connection with illegal immigration, Trocsanyi said “the mass introduction of a foreign population is declared forbidden”. “The amendment reinforces the principle of international law that the state has the right to determine who can live within its territory,” he added.

Another amendment states that any non-Hungarian citizen who comes to Hungary through a country that poses no direct threat of persecution is not entitled to asylum, he noted. The vast majority of asylum seekers and migrants arrive at Hungary’s borders via “safe countries”, where they do not even try to lodge an asylum application, he said in justification of the measure.

Meanwhile, on the subject of the justice system, Trocsanyi said he had always given high priority to establishing organisational independence for the administrative courts. Around 70 years after the Hungarian Royal Administrative Court was abolished, an opportunity has arisen to set up an administrative high court with equal status to the Kuria, Hungary’s supreme court, he said, adding that this measure accorded with Hungarian traditions. He noted that the justice ministry was working on the legislative package to create an independent administrative court and this would be presented to the government.

Trocsanyi said another substantive amendment will affect the judiciary when it comes to interpreting the law, requiring the provision of more detailed legal guidance than is currently the case.

The third area involves firming up protections of private and family life and the home, taking into account trends of recent years such as digitisation, technological development and drones. He insisted that the planned provision accords with the rules in the constitutions of many other countries.