FIFTH SECTION
CASE OF H.A. AND OTHERS v. HUNGARY
(Application no. 39498/18)
 
 
 
 
 
JUDGMENT
 
STRASBOURG
19 June 2025
 
 
This judgment is final but it may be subject to editorial revision. In the case of H.A. and Others v. Hungary,
The European Court of Human Rights (Fifth Section), sitting as a Committee composed of:
 Stéphanie Mourou-Vikström, President,
 Gilberto Felici,
 Kateřina Šimáčková, judges,
and Sophie Piquet, Acting Deputy Section Registrar,
Having regard to:
the application (no. 39498/18) against Hungary lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on 21 August 2018 by six Iraqi nationals, whose relevant details are listed in the appended table, (“the applicants”) who were represented by Ms I. Bieber, a lawyer practising in Budapest;
the decision to give notice of the application to the Hungarian Government (“the Government”), represented by their Agent, Mr Z. Tallódi, of the Ministry of Justice;
the decision not to have the applicants’ names disclosed;
the decision to give priority to the application (Rule 41 of the Rules of Court);
the parties’ observations;
Having deliberated in private on 28 May 2025,
Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date:
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
1. The applicants are an Iraqi family of six (two parents and their four minor children who were, at the relevant time, twelve, six, ten and less than one year old). They fled Iraq in September 2016. They travelled through Turkey, Bulgaria and Serbia and entered the Hungarian transit zone bordering Serbia on 10 July 2018. They immediately submitted an asylum application. 2. On the same day the asylum authority ordered the transit zone in Tompa to be the applicants’ “designated place of stay”. 3. On 22 August 2018, upon the applicants’ request, the Court decided to apply a measure under Rule 39 of the Rules of Court. It indicated to the Hungarian Government to ensure that the environment where the applicants are placed complies with the requirements of Article 3 of the Convention and that the family be kept together, or otherwise to transfer them to the Balassagyarmat reception center. The Government was also requested to keep the Court informed of any developments in the applicants’ situation. 4. On the same day the asylum authority rejected the applicants’ asylum application as inadmissible and found that the principle of non-refoulement did not apply. The asylum authority also expelled the applicants to Serbia. 5. On 14 September 2018 the Government informed the Court that its interim measure has been fully complied with within the transit zone. The family members had been accommodated together there. The Government alleged that the applicants had not signalled any need for assistance in caring for the wheelchair-bound fifth applicant and the community areas for children were accessible by wheelchair. They further argued that the transit zone provided more services, including medical care and social worker assistance, than any in-land reception centre. They also submitted that the fifth applicant was examined by a paediatrician on 11 July 2018, a child neurologist on 7 August 2018 and had an appointment for a special diagnostic examination scheduled for 4 October 2018. 6. Pursuant to the first applicant’s request for the judicial review of the authority’s decision on their application for asylum, on 16 January 2019 the Szeged Administrative and Labour Court quashed the decision and remitted the case to the authority. It also quashed the asylum authority’s decision designating the Tompa transit zone as the applicants’ place of accommodation and remitted the issue to the asylum authority. The court referred to Article 43(2) of the Directive 2013/32/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 26 June 2013 on common procedures for granting and withdrawing international protection, on the basis of which asylum-seekers may only stay in a transit zone for four weeks. 7. On 23 January 2019, in the resumed proceedings, the asylum authority placed the applicants to the Balassagyarmat reception center. According to the applicants, they stayed in the transit zone until 24 January 2019. They then left the reception centre for Germany where they applied for asylum on 15 February 2019. 8. During their stay in the Tompa transit zone the applicants were accommodated in the family sector. Besides the general conditions which have been described in R.R. and Others v. Hungary (no. 36037/17, §§ 10-12, 14-17 and 30-31, 2 March 2021) the applicants complained about the situation of the fifth applicant, a ten-year-old who had restricted mobility since her birth and whose condition was allegedly deteriorating. She had reportedly not received any treatment in Iraq, nor had she been diagnosed. As she could not use her limbs, she used a wheelchair and was dependent on her parents to use the bathroom or to move around in any other way in the transit zone. On 7 August 2018 she was examined at a hospital, where the doctor concluded that she most likely suffered from spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) but an accurate diagnoses could not have been made yet. The applicants alleged that she had not received adequate medical care, including diagnoses and physiotherapy. Furthermore they complained that even though the Government put a wooden threshold ramp in the doorway of the applicants’ container, the premises of the transit zone had not been accessible and that the first applicant had to carry the fifth applicant to the bathroom. 9. The applicants complained about these conditions and the lack of an effective remedy in this respect under Articles 3 and 8 of the Convention, taken alone and in conjunction with Article 13. They also complained about their confinement to the transit zone under Articles 5 §§ 1 and 4 of the Convention. Lastly, they complained under Article 34 of the Convention about the lack of measures taken by the Government in response to the Court’s indication of 22 August 2018 under Rule 39 of the Rules of Court.

Outcome for Article 3: violation