A court in Hungary has rule for the expulsion of an Iraqi refugee from the country for one year amid a new crackdown on the influx of asylum seekers into Europe.
The court on Wednesday charged the Iraqi refugee, identified as Swadi Talib, with illegally crossing a border fence running along Hungary's border with Serbia.
He had crossed the fence on Tuesday, which was the first day of crackdown on the asylum seekers feeling war and execution in the Middle East and North Africa.
"This is a message to others, to potential culprits, that they should not commit this crime," said judge Krisztian Kemenes.
Europe is facing an unprecedented refugee crisis, which has escalated over the summer as refugees are coming directly to the continent instead of staying in camps in neighboring countries.
The continent is now divided over how to deal with the flood of people. Some countries like Germany have taken in a large portion of refugees, while some others including Hungary, Slovakia and Poland have refused to house the refugees and insisted on sending financial support.
Meanwhile, in a separate development, police used tear gas and water cannon to disperse protesting refugees that sought to enter the country from Serbia on Wednesday.
Hundreds of riot police, along with special anti-terrorist units with armored vehicles and water cannon, moved toward a crowd of refugees at the Roszke border crossing.
Hungarian police said a group of what they called “aggressive” refugees has broken through the fence.
Hungarian officials’ mistreatment of the refugees is not reduced to the Tuesday incident as the aid agency Muntada Aid says Muslim refugees are ignored by authorities who repeatedly offer them pork.
“What we witnessed at Roszke shocked us. We saw women, children, babies and elderly people being herded into an open field where they were kept for days without shelter exposed to the cold and rain,” said Kabir Miah, overseas manager at the charity, in a testimony.
Miah added that the authorities had given Muslim refugees sandwiches that contained pork, and even after the asylum seekers refused to eat them, “More sandwiches arrived also containing pork. When one of the volunteers complained a police officer said the refugees should just remove the pork and eat the bread. He said it felt as though the police were mocking them.”
