NGOs turn to public prosecutor over case of man threatening migrants

Budapest, February 19 (MTI) – Human rights organisations have complained that the police have ceased investigating a case of a man who threatened migrants last autumn.

The working group against hate crimes (GYEM) turned to the chief public prosecutor over the case, demanding that the investigation should continue. In their letter, members of GYEM said the 40-year-old man went up to a van on the M1/M7 motorway close to Budapest and insulted the female driver and her passengers, kicking the side of the van and calling on them to get out of the vehicle, otherwise he would throw a hand grenade into their car, according to GYEM’s report.

GYEM said the suspect was originally investigated for vandalism. Since prejudice against migrants was the man’s probable motivation, police should have investigated a crime of violence against members of a community, the working group said.

Members of GYEM include Amnesty International Hungary, the Hungarian Helsinki Committee, the Support Society for Gays and Lesbians, the Legal Defence Bureau for National and Ethnic Minorities (NEKI) and the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union (TASZ).

In an unrelated case, police have raised charges against a Romanian man who attempted to smuggle 21 Iraqi nationals to the West in a van from the Serbian-Hungarian border last autumn, a spokesperson for the regional police said on Friday. Szilvia Szabó said the 25-year-old driver had tried to run away when police stopped his van which had Italian plates, but police caught up with him. The incident took place in the early morning hours of September 3 last year. The man has been in pre-trial detention and now police are pressing charges. The police investigator established that the crime of people smuggling took place with the additional charge of mistreating the victims, Szabó said.

Photo: MTI

Source: http://mtva.hu/hu/hungary-matters