Iranian students: Unfair deportation decision in Hungary

Readers’ letters

The COVID-19 pandemic has marked an unprecedented time, where governments and people have had to adapt quickly in order to survive.

Civil liberties have been sacrificed for the better good of the population and in our case, human rights infringements have happened under the watch of an authoritarian government using this virus as a means to validate their own political agenda. I believe your newspaper would be interested in shedding a light towards a story which has been grossly one-sided thus far in the media. The story is about 15 Iranian students, studying to become doctors/pharmacists and dentists in the EU nation of Hungary, who were recently deported shortly after, the passing of prime minister Viktor Orbán’s ‘total rule’ law.

Our ruling was made within days of our convictions, without the opportunity to a fair defence in court or a trial.

The basis of the expedited deportations and a 3 year EU ban were on the accusations of breaking mandatory hospitalized quarantine. We were forced into this quarantine when we were taken from our homes at 3am despite having signed a contractual agreement to home self-isolation. The conditions at the hospital did not follow WHO protocol as they confined 5-6 students into one room prior to testing our COVID-19 status’.

Many events followed with our time at the hospital including, failure to provide adequate PPE/ sanitary items in the joint rooms, failure to remove those with a positive COVID-19 test from the rooms and overall intimidation with the police presence at the hospital.

Following our hospital horrors many were transferred to detention centres 3 hours from the capital, which are in many sources, compared to maximum state prisons in other surrounding countries.

The series of unfortunate events ended with us all being stripped of our right to continue our educations in Hungary and any EU nation.

This story was covered in Hungarian national newspapers who only showed the governments narration of the story, leaving us students no opportunity to tell our side of the story, and the truth of the events. There are many other details and evidences to back our claims in which we would be happy to disclose to you should you want to print our story.

Timeline:

We have started a campaign (@VOISCAMPAIGN), to share our side of the story and details that the news has left out. We hope that this will bring to light some injustices that happened during this vulnerable time.

https://www.facebook.com/beourvois/posts/104352934605916

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3 Comments

ISTVAN KIRALY says:

05/05/2020 at 15:11

Here I was thinking that we’d heard the last of you people !

I can just imagine the sound of Persian Tars playing to words (probably in Farsi) which in effect say :
“Poor Iranian students have been wrongly treated by those nasty Hungarians. Help us overcome this terrible injustice ! It isn’t fair.”

Oh dear.

I must be missing something in this narrative.

You Iranian students have the TEMERITY to label the Hungarian Government as ‘authoritarian’ !

For the record, it is a DEMOCRATICALLY-ELECTED Government and the Corona Virus Response Act has done NOTHING to change that fact.

What about the so-called ‘government’ of Iran which is – in reality – a rabid mob of religious fanatics who dictate THEIR will on the population according to some antiquated beliefs ??

THAT IS AN AUTHORITARIAN GOVERNMENT !!

You want to mention ‘human rights infringements’ ?

Before you do so, look very carefully at your own country !

How many INNOCENT PEOPLE are imprisoned there – or suffer a worse fate – for the least of ‘crimes’ ?

I pride myself on being an INTELLIGENT PERSON and was absolutely AMAZED by the actions exhibited by several of your group : throwing furniture around rooms, ejecting items from hospital windows, shouting at medical staff, arguing with the police …..

You have GOT to be kidding if you honestly believe that you acted in a responsible way, yet alone as future ‘medical professionals’.

In Iran I suspect that some of you might even have been SHOT by the authorities for such behaviour.

There is NO DOUBT that several of your group brought the Corona Virus infection back from Iran – knowingly or unwittingly is irrelevant but you knew of this fact- so you should NOT have been arrogant (yet alone aggressive) in your behaviour AT ANY TIME.

By all means write your articles on ‘social media’ and you might even obtain help from some ‘bleeding-heart’ left wing / neo-liberal organisations to fund an ‘appeal’ at some ‘court’ in the E.U.

I for one am very glad that you are no longer in Hungary.

You certainly would not be welcome.
Pesti Srác says:

05/05/2020 at 19:51

I agree with István Király.
Spoiled rich kids.
Finish your degrees in Iran and cure your country first before you try to cure ours or any other country.
Viktorious says:

06/05/2020 at 07:47

Dear Istvan,
You are 115% right.
Let’s all pray that Brussels kicks out Hungary out of the EU asap, so we can prove them wrong.
Hungary is the most Glorious Nation ever, with God on our side. We don’t need any foreign investment, or filthy tourists crawling our Holy Soil.
Even without these, hard working Hungarians will prove our economy is booming even more than Belarus, Moldova and Ukraine!