EU EASTERN BORDERS: Anti-NGO law proposed in Hungary ― Poland extends controversial asylum law ― Return-focused reception centre to be piloted in Finland ― Lithuania takes Belarus to court over irregular border crossings

• A Hungarian MP has tabled a legislative proposal aimed at severely restricting the activities of NGOs.
• Polish MPs have voted overwhelmingly to extend the duration of the controversial new asylum law.
• The Finnish Immigration Service is planning to pilot a new type of reception centre with a focus on promoting and supporting voluntary and forced returns.
• The government of Lithuania has filed a case against Belarus at the International Court of Justice relating to irregular crossings of the countries’ shared border.

A Hungarian MP has tabled a legislative proposal aimed at severely restricting the activities of NGOs. According to the proposal, which was tabled by János Halász MP from the ruling Fidesz party, organisations that pose a “threat” to Hungary’s sovereignty will be subject to various requirements, including no longer being able to accept foreign funding without authorisation, no longer being eligibility for personal tax relief and having to declare their assets. Halász justified his proposal on the grounds that “cases of serious infringements on Hungary’s sovereignty have come to light”. His accusations are similar to others made previously by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. In a speech on 15 March, Orbán described NGOs and other critics of his government as “bugs who have made it through the winter” and said that “spring cleaning” would start by Easter. In an op-ed published by the EUobserver news agency on 15 May, Daniel Hegedüs from the German Marshall Fund of the United States wrote that the design of the draft law “surpasses all previous efforts in its open attack on basic democratic norms and fundamental rights in Hungary, as well as on the core principles of EU law and the authority and competences of the European Commission.” He urged the European Commission (EC) to recognise the “unprecedented nature of this attack, not only on the last remaining bulwarks of pluralist liberal democracy in an increasingly authoritarian Hungary, but also on the EU legal order and the commission’s own institutional prerogatives”. Despite Hegedüs and others’ impassioned appeals, the EC appeared to be taking a “wait and see” approach to the situation: “We are following this process closely for now. Since this is a draft law, we will not comment on its details,” an EC spokesperson told journalists in Brussels on 16 May. Four days later, a group of Hungarian NGOs, including ECRE member organisation the Hungarian Helsinki Committee issued a joint statement in which they called on the EC, the European Parliament, EU member states and the Council of Europe to act urgently in order to prevent what they have dubbed “Operation Starve and Strangle” from being completed. The draft law is reportedly scheduled for a final vote during the parliamentary session on 10-12 June.

Polish MPs have voted overwhelmingly to extend the duration of the controversial new asylum law. On 21 May, 366 MPS voted in favour of extending the law which prevents people who have entered Poland from Belarus from claiming asylum for an additional 60 days. 17 MPs from the Left (Lewica) and Together (Razem) parties voted against the extension. The law entered into force in March 2025 for an initial period of 60 days. Two days before the vote in the Sejm (lower house of parliament), ECRE member organisation the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights submitted a negative opinion on Prime Minister Tusk’s request to extend the law. Describing the law as “unconstitutional”, the organisation denounced both the “extreme degree of generalisation of opinions about aggressive behaviour of migrants” and the government’s efforts to conceal the “humanitarian aspect of the crisis on the border, including subsequent cases of death and reports of violence experienced by migrants by both Polish and Belarusian services”.

The Finnish Immigration Service (Migri) is planning to pilot a new type of reception centre with a focus on promoting and supporting voluntary and forced returns. According to a press release issued on 9 May, the pilot scheme will be launched in June 2025 at a reception centre in Vantaa. In addition to normal reception services, the centre will start providing people seeking asylum with “more extensive advice on voluntary return and support with return arrangements”. According to Migri Director General Ilkka Haahtela: “The pilot scheme is necessary because voluntary and forced returns are currently not sufficiently quick and efficient in situations where right of residence in Finland cannot be granted”. “Our goal is that applicants who have received a negative decision return to their countries of origin as soon as possible and that a larger number of people will use the voluntary return option,” he added.

Elsewhere, Finland has completed the first 35km of a new fence along its border with Russia. According to the Finnish Border Guard, the fence, which will eventually extend along 200 km of the 1,344 km Finland-Russia border is “absolutely necessary” for the maintenance of border security. “The main purpose of the fence is to control a large mass of people if they are trying to enter from Russia to Finland,” said the deputy commander of the Southeast Finland Border Guard district, Antti Virta. “From the Border Guard’s perspective, it improves our ability to perform border surveillance, to act if there’s some kind of disruption at the border or a border incident,” added her colleague, Head of Operations Samuel Siljanen. The fence is due to be completed by the end of 2026.

The government of Lithuania has filed a case against Belarus at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) relating to irregular crossings of the countries’ shared border. Lithuania has accused its neighbour of violating the United Nations Protocol Against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air by “enabling migrant smuggling, failing to secure its borders, neglecting co-operation with enforcement authorities and disregarding the rights of migrants”.  According to Lithuanian Minister of Justice Rimantas Mockus, “Lithuania’s reputation must be safeguarded and the Belarusian regime must be held legally accountable for orchestrating the wave of illegal migration and the resulting human rights violations”. “We are taking this case to the International Court of Justice to send a clear message: no state can use vulnerable people as political pawns without facing consequences under international law,” he added. The decision to file a case at the ICJ comes less than two weeks after the Lithuanian government announced that it would deploy additional military personnel to the Lithuania-Belarus border in response to a reported rise in the number of irregular crossings.

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