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"We are not dogs, we are humans, in our country we don't have money, we don't have anything"

Date & Time 2022-10-26
Location Horgos
Reported by Collective Aid
Coordinates 46.1527346, 19.9655305
Pushback from Hungary
Pushback to Serbia
Taken to a police station no
Minors involved yes
WLTI* involved no
Men involved yes
Age 4 - 23
Group size 11
Countries of origin Syria, Morocco
Treatment at police station or other place of detention
Overall number of policemen and policewomen involved 3
Violence used beating (with batons/hands/other), pushing people to the ground, pepper spray, threatening with guns, forcing to undress, destruction of personal belongings
Police involved 3 Hungarian policemen

The respondent is an 18 year old man from Morocco. On the 5th of September around 10 pm, he tried to cross between Hungary and Serbia with 7 people from Morocco too, all men aged between 20 and 23 years old. When they were pushed back there was also another group with families, at least 2 women and 2 children of 10 and 4 years old from Syria.

The respondent states that the police saw them right at the moment they were crossing the border, when he was climbing the fence. He reports that, what he describes as three Hungarian policemen caught him and made him fall from the fence. They reportedly started hitting him with a baton and the handle of a firearm. He sustained injuries on the head and leg, and was bleeding and couldn’t bend his leg. After this, he reports that they made him take off his clothes until he was naked. The policemen also reportedly broke his phone and took 150€ and his powerbank from him. The respondent recalls an interaction whereby one of the policemen asked him “It’s my home, why did you come?” he answered, “I came to go to Europe, it’s not for you”. The policemen replied, “it’s not my business” and continued to hit him.

Meanwhile his friends tried to escape from the policemen by running away but the respondent reports that they also got caught and the police sprayed pepper spray on them. The officers reportedly took pictures of his friends but not him, he assumes because he was bleeding. He reports that there were a lot of policemen present but he doesn’t recall how many because he couldn’t see them all.

Another group with at least  2 women and 2 children was there too, and the respondent reports the police hit all of them as well.

After that, they reportedly made all of them get on a bus to the border police office. When they arrived at what the respondent described as the border station, the officers there reportedly made them run to go back to Serbia, pointing a gun at them and saying “1,2, I am going to kill you”.

 

The respondent stated: “We are not dogs, we are humans, in our country we don’t have money, we don’t have anything”.  “It doesn’t happen only to me, it happened to all the people that you see here”.