At 8 p.m. in the evening of Sunday, December 12, the respondent and his transit group, roughly twenty other men, all from Afghanistan, crossed the border from Serbia to Hungary near the Serbian town of Horgos. Shortly afterwards, they were apprehended by four Hungarian policemen. “They made us all lie on the ground,” said the respondent.

“They kicked and punched us. They were smiling and laughing as they beat us. We were crying and they were laughing. They tried to hit me in the head with their batons, but I held up my hand to protect my face.”

The respondent claimed that he was struck in the hand, which began to bleed. He also related how he received blows to the back of his leg. He estimated the beating to have lasted twenty minutes. Fifty minutes later, a vehicle came and took the group to the Horgos-Roszke border crossing.