NGO Oxfam has accused police in the Balkans and Eastern Europe of abusing migrants saying they were beaten by officers and left in the cold.
The new report from Oxfam titled “A Dangerous Game” claims that “violence, brutality and unlawful treatment by authorities on the Western Balkan route are a frequent occurrence”. The report asked 140 migrants about their experiences along the Balkan route and accused the police in several countries of abuse.
In Serbia, the NGO claims a group of migrants, including a two-year-old child, were taken to a forest near the Bulgarian border and left there in the cold. They say that in another case in the country migrants appeared in court to claim asylum and afterwards, police, who were supposed to take them to a reception centre, tore up court documents and left them near the Bulgarian border.
In Croatia, authorities are said to have forced migrants to strip off their clothes along the border with Serbia running past officers who hit them with batons.
Hungary is also mentioned in the report as having allegedly abused migrants. Previously pro-migrant NGOs have accused the Hungarian authorities of mistreatment, though the government has denied reports. Several Hungarian border authorities have been investigated in the past with a few officers fined for misconduct.
Oxfam claims Hungarian border guards forced migrants to “take off their clothes and sit in snow as they poured cold water over them”.
The research was conducted by the Belgrade Centre for Human Rights (BCHR) and the Macedonian Young Lawyers Association (MYLA). The BCHR lists left wing billionaire George Soros’s Open Society Foundations as one of its donors on its website.
OSF and Mr. Soros have been having difficulties operating in several Eastern European countries as many leaders see Soros as a force for open borders and mass migration. Reports by Breitbart News Network are said to have been influential at exposing the work of NGOs linked to Soros and Open Society according to some sources.
Prime Minister of Hungary Viktor Orbán has been especially critical of Soros, calling his network of pro-mass migration NGOs “extremely dangerous”. Earlier this week Prime Minister Orbán told Hungarian radio there is a “well-established international campaign, which has been ongoing for more than a decade. It can be linked to the name of George Soros, and it seeks to prove that borders make no sense and that nations have no right to decide for themselves whom they wish their peoples to live together with.”
Follow Chris Tomlinson on Twitter at @TomlinsonCJ or email at ctomlinson@breitbart.com
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