November 2024

The serious dysfunction of the Asylum Service & the reception system continues

Due to the interruption of interpretation services in the regional asylum offices and units of the Asylum service on the mainland and Crete, even the simplest procedures cannot be carried out. Scheduled interviews are postponed without the applicants knowing when they will take place, leaving them in a state of prolonged uncertainty.

At the same time, due to the lack of interpretation, access to asylum is absolutely impossible. The platform of the Ministry of Migration and Asylum is most of the time non accessible or does not grant an appointment date for the registration of the request for international protection at the Malakasa and Diavata Reception and Identification Centers (RICs). In addition, scheduled registrations of subsequent applications for international protection at the regional asylum offices on the mainland do not take place. As a result people who want to lodge an application for international protection are not protected from possible arrest and detention and do not have access to reception conditions.  

Within this framework, the Asylum Service shifts the burden to asylum seekers. In order for the registration of the asylum application or the interview to take place, applicants are requested either to carry them out in Greek or English or to find by themselves a person third person to be present while these procedures and to assist them with the interpretation. These practices are directly contrary to national legislation and European Union law.

In a joint Letter, 38 civil society organizations, including the GCR, call on the authorities to immediately fill the gaps in interpretation, underlining that the relevant services are funded by the EU Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund.

At the same time, in the Malakasa RIC, applicants remain in a state of deprivation of liberty for long periods of time, in totally inadequate conditions, while the competent authorities refuse to certify the authenticity of the signatures of the residents of the RIC on the grounds that the relevant procedures have not been completed, thus preventing the residents from being legally represented.

According to the law, the stay in the RICs/CCACs (de facto measure, according to a recent decision of the Athens Administrative Court of First Instance) may not exceed 25 days, during which time the procedures for reception and identification and registration of an asylum application must have been completed.    

Recently, the Greek Council for Refugees has supported cases of people who remained in the Malakasa RIC from the beginning of September until November 2024, while the Greek Ombudsman, following GCR's intervention, has addressed relevant questions to the Administration.

There are also significant shortcomings regarding the protection of unaccompanied minors, e.g. at the Malakasa RIC where approximately 200 unaccompanied children remained in mid-November, there were only two guardians. As a result the vast majority of the unaccompanied children remained without a guardian. At the same time, significant shortages of clothing, the total absence of activities for children, and prolonged stays in the camp, which in some cases exceed two months, are reported. Similarly, in the Close Controlled Access Center (CCAC) of Kos, there is only one guardian for about 200 unaccompanied children.

Concluding Observations of the UN Human Rights Committee on Greece

The United Nations Human Rights Committee (UN HRC) calls on the Greek authorities to cease the alleged practice of arbitrary and collective expulsion of aliens, in its Concluding Observations adopted in November 2024, within the context of the monitoring of the compliance of the Greek Authorities with International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The Committee "remains seriously concerned about multiple reports of 'pushbacks'pushbacks'pushbacks' at Greece's maritime and land borders; in violation of the principle of non-refoulement. In this respect, the Commission is deeply concerned about allegations of excessive use of force, ill-treatment, detention in solitary confinement, and lack of procedural and legal safeguards, in the context of pushback operations […]  The Commission is also concerned about the lack of systematic investigation into allegations of refoulement and the lack of accountability", note inter alia the UN HRC’s Concluding Observations. 

The Greek Council for Refugees had submitted a written contribution to the HRC prior to the examination of the Greek authorities.

New GCR Report “AT EUROPE’S BORDERS: PUSHBACKS CONTINUE AS IMPUNITY PERSISTS”

Pushbacks continue as a comprehensive, systematic, carefully planned migration and border policy, stresses the new GCR Report “At Europe’s borders: pushbacks continue as impunity persists”.

The report provides a detailed description of 12 pushback cases in the Evros border region occurred in 2023. Additionally, it presents the details of the domestic criminal investigations and the latest 2023-2024 judicial developments of 3 earlier pushback cases. All cases presented in the report are legally represented by GCR before the European Court of Human Rights.

New testimonies from pushback victims offer a disturbing insight into the organized and systematic nature of these illegal practices of the Greek authorities - in consistency with the latest numerous credible reports from UN, European and national human rights bodies, institutions and organizations, documenting the same modus operandi The above contradicts the ‘lack of evidence’ narrative that is still perpetuated by EU and Greek authorities.

Despite the numerous reports on pushbacks of thousands of asylum seekers, recorded victims’ testimonies, as well as the witnesses and video evidence in some cases, not a single pushback case has been tried in a Greek courtroom.

Read the Report and the Executive Summary.. 

Rejection of asylum applications based on the concept of "safe third country" despite the judgment of the Court of Justice of the EU.

In October 2024, the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU), following a request for a preliminary ruling sent by the Greek Council of State, referring in particular to the suspension of readmissions in Turkey from March 2020, ruled that EU law does not allow Member States to reject asylum applications as inadmissible, on the basis of the safe third country concept, where that country does not in fact accept the readmission of those persons (Case C-134/2023).

However, despite the judgment of the CJEU, which is binding for the Greek Authorities, until today the GCR is aware of asylum applications that are rejected as inadmissible under the safe third country concept, while, as far as GCR is aware, no relevant instructions or guidance have been issued to the Asylum Service in order to ensure compliance with the CJEU judgment. 

Administrative Detention: Joint Communication of GCR & ECRE to the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe

Only 1 in 5 administrative detainees have access to a judicial remedy before a Court to review the lawfulness of the detention, and additionally the judicial control itself remains in many cases limited and non-effective. These are highlighted, inter alia, by the GCR and ECRE in the joint Communication before the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe, in the context of the monitoring of the execution of a group of Cases of the European Court of Human Rights on the accessibility and effectiveness of the legal remedy against immigration detention in Greece (Objections against Detention). The Communication highlights systemic deficiencies that undermine the effective access of administrative detainees to legal remedies (lack of information to detainees about the reasons of their detention, absence of a system of free legal aid) and issues relating to the effectiveness of judicial review, with extensive reference to examples from the case law of the Greek Administrative Courts on Objections to Detention.

The full GCR/ECRE Joint Memorandum.  

Recognized stateless refugee reunited with his family in Greece after years

After 5 years of systematic interventions of the GCR, including an application before the European Court of Human Rights, the wife and two minor children of a stateless recognized refugee have been reunited with him in Greece. Family reunification procedure enhances movement through safe and legal channels, so that refugees are not forced to risk their lives and resort to traffickers' networks. Even today, 18 years after the entry into force of the relevant national legislation (P.D. 131/2006), recognized refugees continue to face serious obstacles in the implementation of the family reunification procedureRead more here.