Topic: Justice

The Hungarian Helsinki Committee’s replies to requests to provide information by the Hungarian national focal point for the FRANET research network of the EU’s Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA)

The Hungarian Helsinki Committee (HHC) utilised all human rights CSO tools (research, advocacy, empowerment, strategic litigation, public- and professional awareness raising) to eliminate mandatory glass partitioning between inmates and their family members in Hungarian prisons during visits for seven years. The seven-year-long status quo is currently changing.

The Hungarian Helsinki Committee participated at the 2024 OSCE Human Dimension Conference and took the floor and provided written submissions on the situation of human rights defenders and civic space, on the rights of asylum-seekers … Read more

The Hungarian Helsinki Committee coordinated a coalition of three civil society organisations (CSOs) working in Hungary to contribute to General Comment 27 of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (UN CRC), which focuses on children’s rights to access to justice and effective remedies. In its draft General Comment, the CRC aims to clarify the terms, approaches and actions that States should take to implement the right of all children to access to justice and effective remedies when their rights under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child fail to be respected.

The two-year novel capacity-building programme by the Hertie School Executive Education and the Hungarian Helsinki Committee, concludes in Berlin.

Hungary has been failing to implement judgments of the European Court of Human Rights that established rights violations with regard to applicants sentenced to whole life imprisonment and life imprisonment with the possibility of a parole. In its recent submission, the HHC demonstrates once again how the Hungarian authorities had not only failed to carry out the necessary legal changes, but that individual measures that would be required to bring the violations to an end with regard to the applicants are prevented as well.

The Hungarian Helsinki Committee contributes as a project partner to the EU-funded project ‘LGBTIQ Detainees: Strengthening the rights of LGBTIQ detainees in the EU’, coordinated by the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute of Fundamental and Human Rights. … Read more

The HHC submitted a communication to the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe regarding the execution of the judgments in the X.Y. v. Hungary group of cases on pre-trial detention. The communication argues that the group of judgments cannot be considered implemented, and deficiencies regarding pre-trial measures in the Hungarian criminal justice system remain.

The Criminal Justice Programme of the Hungarian Helsinki Committee (HHC) drafted a comprehensive response to the EU’s Fundamental Rights Agency’s (FRA) FRANET research network’s Hungarian focal point touching upon 18 topics related to Criminal Detention in the European Union: Conditions and Monitoring.

A ministerial decree has been published, outlining the comprehensive rules for the implementing of a credit system in Hungarian penitentiary institutions starting from March 1st 2024. The core concept of the credit system revolves around the accumulation of … Read more

Nine years after the European Court of Human Rights condemned Hungary for violating the prohibition of inhuman and degrading treatment due to its prison conditions, detainees continue to face substandard living conditions that fall short … Read more

Hungary has failed to implement judgments of the European Court of Human Rights that established large-scale rights violations concerning detention conditions. The Hungarian Helsinki Committee has expressed concern several times regarding the recent surge in the number of persons detained in Hungarian penitentiaries, which led to overcrowding and substandard detention conditions. Additionally, evidence is provided by the Hungarian Helsinki Committee (HHC) that there is still a lack of effective remedy for prisoners against decisions taken in the prison system, along with the compensation system suffering from several shortcomings already clearly identified by the Committee of Ministers.

Since 2017, the Hungarian National Penitentiary Administration ordered prisons to conduct the most common prison visits in groups where several detainees and their visitors are separated by a plastic partition, a so-called plexiglass wall, under control, regardless of their security classification, without an individual risk assessment. Any physical contact between detainees and their visitors is strictly prohibited. In October 2023, the European Court of Human Rights found that this general practice violates the right to respect for private and family life – Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Prisoners are just as vulnerable to insect bites as others living in closed institutions.

In an ever-evolving legal landscape, staying ahead of the curve is essential. The STARLIGHT programme, a joint initiative by the Hertie School and the Hungarian Helsinki Committee (HHC), has paved the way for 60 legal practitioners in the European Union to harness the full potential of the Charter of Fundamental Rights (CFR) through strategic litigation.

HHC attended the OSCE Warsaw Human Dimension Conference and submitted statements on shrinking civic space, violations of the rights of migrants and asylum-seekers, freedom of assembly, and the rule of law.

The transit zones have been shut down for three and a half years, but this cruel detention regime did not disappear without a trace, still haunting the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. On … Read more

The state must not abandon victims of police ill-treatment, even if they are collectively expelled foreigners. Nor can it grant impunity to abusers in uniform, a Strasbourg Court judgment confirmed yesterday. Hungarian police officers had … Read more

Are you a lawyer, passionate about protecting fundamental rights across Europe, and eager to develop your skills and knowledge to unlock the power of the Charter of Fundamental Rights (the Charter)? If so, STARLIGHT is for you.

In 2015, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) concluded in its pilot judgment delivered in the case of Gazsó v. Hungary that violations of the right to a hearing within a reasonable time in … Read more