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Hungary to detain all asylum seekers in container camps

The Hungarian Parliament approved a law that allows the detention of all asylum-seekers until their requests are processed. PM calls migration ‘Trojan horse…

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It's not only in the US where populist and anti-immigration policies are gaining terrain.

One day after Trump's cabinet announced his second travel ban order - which affects six Muslim-majority countries- the Hungarian Parliament has approved a law that allows the detention of all asylum-seekers until their requests are processed.

The new controversial legislation, which is due to be enacted in eight days, means asylum-seekers will now only be able to present their cases from transit zones located on the border, where they will have to wait in special centers until the process is complete.

Asylum seekers in Hungary, which hundreds of thousands entered in 2015 in the hope of reaching western Europe, can at present be held for up to four weeks if they are apprehended within five miles of the border, but the new rules remove the time limit and will apply countrywide. Unaccompanied minors below the age of 14 will be put in the care of the country’s child protection services.

"The Socialists and several other members of the opposition voted against the law. They again served the interests of migrants and not the Hungarian people," said the government on its official Facebook page.

The law was approved by members of the ruling Fidesz party, a nationalist and populist group led by Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

Fidesz boasts an absolute majority in the Hungarian Parliament.

The transit zones are located on the border with Serbia and consist of containers where migrants will have to hand in their petitions and wait for their resolution.

Should their request for asylum be rejected, they will have no option but to return to Serbia.

"From now on migrants with an unclear status can not move freely in the country," said a government statement, adding that this would improve the security situation in the country.  Orbán also called migration “a Trojan horse for terrorism”.

The spokeswoman for the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR), Cécile Pouilly, denounced the measure, saying it violated Hungary's obligations with respect to international rights and the laws of the European Union.

According to her, international and EU laws dictate that the detention of refugees and asylum seekers only occur when strictly necessary and that children should never be detained.

"This new law will have a terrible physical and psychological impact on women, children and men who have already greatly suffered," she said.

The law will only be in force while the country is in an alert state due to mass migration, a status that was enforced in late 2015 and is expected to last until Sept. 2017.

Hungary has recently approved a series of measures to curb migration, including building a second fence on the border with Serbia, though NGOs estimate that there are only around 400 asylum-seekers in the country.

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