National Security-Related Expulsion Cases during the Pandemic in Hungary: Secret Revealed?

Abstract

The research investigates the reasons behind the surge in the number of expulsion cases awaiting resolution by the Constitutional Court of Hungary during the initial year of the pandemic by conducting an analysis. Identity between the cases examined can be discovered along issues related to factual and legal merits, which in several cases is the cause of the problem and the effect of which draws attention to the right to an effective remedy. The study focuses on the factual and legal issues of decisions on expulsion and entry and residence bans from the point of view of legally established third-country nationals residing in Hungary. The study explores Constitutional Court and high court decisions of the period compared to the relevant case law of the Supreme Court in a comprehensible manner and digs up the roots of the identified common problems. Exploring the legal basis in the light of basic international and EU law obligations, both access to classified documents and a system of appeal against decisions constitute a set of complex, completely independent and unrelated procedures, that ultimately means that the facts on which the expulsion is based, which are also particularly difficult to ascertain, cannot be effectively disputed.