Testimonies from patients and corroborating medical data from the humanitarian organisation Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) indicate an alarming and repeated use of violence, allegedly committed by Hungarian authorities, against people crossing the border between Serbia and Hungary. Beatings with belts and batons, kicking, punching, various forms of humiliation, and use of pepper spray, and teargas are all reported to be common deterrence practices, prior to pushbacks and denial of assistance.
For more than eight years, MSF doctors and nurses have continued to treat and record accounts of people being systematically beaten, humiliated and abused at borders for seeking safety in the European Union.
Since January 2021, MSF mobile medical teams have treated 423 patients with injuries, reportedly due to violent incidents at the Hungary-Serbia border. Most of these accounts follow a similar pattern of beatings, denial of access to basic needs, and harassment, often with racially charged humiliation. Some people say they experienced theft and the destruction of personal belongings, while others were forced to strip, even in cold winter temperatures, and sometimes endured other forms of humiliation such as being urinated on by border officials during roundups.
MSF also treats injuries resulting from people falling off the 4-metre-high system of fences and razor wire built along the border. “One patient had a 2-centimetre-deep cut on his upper lip because of the razor blades on the border fence. Many others report fractures all over their bodies from falling while trying to cross,” continues Marcetic.
Several patients, including two unaccompanied minors, reported to MSF that they were transported to a small shipping container before being expelled to Serbia. Here, they say, border officials systematically assaulted them and regularly released pepper spray inside the container. Two patients reported the additional use of teargas, which is apparently dispersed inside the container to force people to create space for newcomers.
The container is described as being 2 by 4 meters in size, with a single door and sometimes windowless. In their testimonies, patients said they were denied water, food, access to toilets and were sprayed if they demanded any of these basic needs. Further exchanges with other community members have highlighted that this practice is not isolated but frequently observed on a wider scale.
MSF at the Hungary-Serbia Border
MSF has been present in Serbia since 2014, providing medical care to migrants in transit through the Balkan route. In 2022, two mobile clinics are providing primary healthcare, psycho-social support and health promotion activities in informal settlements in northern Serbia, close to the Hungary-Serbia and Serbia-Romania borders. To date our medical teams have treated 1844 patients. Since 2021, 423 patients have been assessed and treated for physical injuries, mostly on the arms and legs, including contusions, articular or skin lesions allegedly due to physical assaults at the hands of Hungarian border forces or because of lacerations due to the razor-wired fence along the border. All the patients who were involved in a violent incident at the border reported being pushed back into Serbia.
