International Courant
34 minutes in the past
By Lucile Smith and Ben Steele, BBC TV Present Affairs
BBC
Greece’s coast guard has prompted the deaths of dozens of migrants within the Mediterranean over the previous three years, witnesses say, together with 9 who had been intentionally thrown into the water.
The 9 are amongst greater than 40 individuals believed to have died on account of being expelled from Greek territorial waters or returned to sea after reaching the Greek islands, in keeping with evaluation by the BBC.
The Greek Coast Guard advised our investigation that it strongly rejects all allegations of unlawful actions.
We confirmed footage of twelve individuals being loaded onto a Greek Coast Guard boat after which left on a rubber boat to a former senior Greek Coast Guard officer. As he rose from his chair, together with his microphone nonetheless on, he mentioned it was “clearly unlawful” and “a world crime.”
The Greek authorities has carried out that lengthy accused of pressured return – pushing individuals again to Turkey the place they got here from, which is illegitimate underneath worldwide legislation.
However that is the primary time the BBC has calculated the variety of incidents claiming fatalities on account of the actions of the Greek Coast Guard.
The 15 incidents we analyzed – dated Could 2020-23 – resulted in 43 deaths. The preliminary sources had been primarily native media, NGOs and the Turkish coast guard.
Verifying such reviews is extraordinarily tough: witnesses typically disappear or are too afraid to talk out. However in 4 of those circumstances, we had been capable of verify the tales by talking to eyewitnesses.
Our analysis, which options in a brand new BBC documentary, Deathly quiet: murders within the medical world?instructed a transparent sample.
This man from Cameroon advised the BBC that he was thrown into the ocean by the coast guard and that his two companions drowned
In 5 of the incidents, migrants mentioned they had been thrown instantly into the ocean by Greek authorities. In 4 of these circumstances, they defined how they landed on Greek islands however had been hunted down. In a number of different incidents, migrants mentioned they had been placed on inflatable rafts with out motors, which then deflated or appeared to have a leak.
One of the crucial chilling tales was given by a Cameroonian man, who says he was hunted by Greek authorities after touchdown on the island of Samos in September 2021.
Like all of the individuals we interviewed, he mentioned he deliberate to register as an asylum seeker on Greek territory.
“We had barely docked and the police got here from behind,” he advised us. “There have been two cops wearing black, and three others in plain garments. They had been masked, you can solely see their eyes.”
He and two others – one other from Cameroon and a person from Ivory Coast – had been taken to a Greek coast guard boat, he mentioned, the place occasions took a terrifying flip.
“They began with the (different) Cameroonian. They threw him into the water. The Ivorian man mentioned: ‘Save me, I do not wish to die… and ultimately solely his hand was above the water and his physique under.
‘Slowly his hand slipped underneath the water and the water engulfed him.’
Our interviewee says his captors beat him.
“Blows rained down on my head. It was like hitting an animal.” After which he says they pushed him into the water too, with no life jacket. He was capable of swim to shore, however the our bodies of the opposite two – Sidy Keita and Didier Martial Kouamou Nana – had been recovered on the Turkish coast.
The survivor’s attorneys are demanding that Greek authorities open a double homicide case.
Deathly quiet: murders within the medical world?
In June 2023, an overloaded trawler results in entrance of a Greek Coast Guard patrol boat. Greater than 600 males, girls and kids die within the water. However who’s accountable and is the Coast Guard accountable?
Watch on iPlayer or on BBC Two at 9pm on Monday 17 June.
One other man, from Somalia, advised the BBC how he was arrested on arrival on the island of Chios in March 2021 by the Greek military, who then handed him over to the Greek coast guard.
He mentioned the Coast Guard tied his arms behind his again earlier than dropping him into the water.
‘They threw me into the center of the ocean with a zipper tie. They wished me to die,” he mentioned.
He mentioned he managed to outlive by floating on his again earlier than certainly one of his arms separated from the ligature. However the sea was uneven and three of his group died. Our interviewee reached the touchdown the place he was ultimately noticed by the Turkish coast guard.
Within the incident with the best lack of life – in September 2022 – a ship with 85 migrants on board bumped into hassle close to the Greek island of Rhodes when its engine failed.
Mohamed, from Syria, advised us they known as the Greek coast guard for assist, who loaded them onto a ship, took them again to Turkish waters and put them in life rafts. Mohamed says the lid of the raft he and his household obtained was not closed correctly.
“We instantly began sinking, they noticed that… All of them heard us screaming, and but they left us behind,” he advised the BBC.
“The primary youngster to die was my cousin’s son… After that it was one after the other. One other youngster, one other youngster, after which my cousin himself disappeared. By morning, seven or eight kids had died.
“My kids solely died within the morning… simply earlier than the Turkish coast guard arrived.”
Greek legislation permits all migrants in search of asylum to register their functions on totally different islands at particular registration facilities.
However our interviewees – who we contacted with the assistance of Consolidated Rescue Group, the migrant help group – mentioned they had been stopped earlier than they may attain these centres. They mentioned these males would apparently function undercover, with out uniforms and sometimes masked.
Human rights teams declare that hundreds of individuals in search of asylum in Europe have been illegally returned from Greece to Turkey and denied the best to hunt asylum, which is enshrined in worldwide and EU legislation.
Austrian activist Fayad Mulla advised us that he found for himself in February final 12 months on the Greek island of Lesbos how secretive such operations appear to be.
When he drove to the placement of an alleged pressured return following a tip, he was stopped by a person in a hoodie, who later turned out to work for the police. He mentioned police then tried to delete the footage of his arrest from his dashcam and charged him with resisting a police officer.
In the end, no additional motion was taken.
Fayad Mulla
Fayad Mulla’s dashcam captured the second he was stopped by undercover police after being tipped off a few pressured return to Lesbos
Two months later, in an analogous spot, Mr. Mulla managed to movie a pressured return, printed by The New York Instances.
A bunch, consisting of ladies and infants, was unloaded from the again of an unmarked van and marched by means of a jetty to a small boat.
They had been then transferred to a Greek Coast Guard ship additional away from the shoreline, taken out to sea after which positioned on a raft the place they had been left to drift.
We confirmed these photos – which the BBC has verified – to Dimitris Baltakos, the previous head of particular operations on the Greek Coast Guard.
In the course of the interview, he declined to take a position about what the footage confirmed, having denied earlier in our dialog that the Greek coast guard ought to ever do something unlawful. However throughout a break he was recorded saying to somebody in Greek:
“I did not inform them a lot, did I? It’s totally clear, is not it. It isn’t nuclear physics. I do not know why they did it in broad daylight… It is… clearly unlawful. It is a world crime.’
‘It is clearly unlawful’ – second former senior Coast Guardsman speaks off digital camera
Greece’s Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Island Coverage advised the BBC that the pictures had been presently being investigated by the nation’s impartial Nationwide Transparency Authority.
An investigative journalist we spoke to on the island of Samos says she began chatting with a member of the Greek particular forces on the relationship app Tinder.
When he known as her from what he described as a ‘warship’, Romy van Baarsen requested him extra about his work – and what occurred when his troops noticed a refugee boat.
He responded that they had been “driving them again”, and mentioned such orders had been “from the minister”, including that they’d be punished in the event that they didn’t cease a ship.
Greece has at all times denied that so-called ‘pushbacks’ are happening.
Greece is a gateway to Europe for a lot of migrants. There have been final 12 months 263,048 arrivals by sea in Europe, with Greece receiving 41,561 (16%) of them. Turkey signed an settlement with the EU in 2016 to forestall migrants and refugees from coming into Greece, however mentioned in 2020 it may now not implement it.
Journalist Romy van Baarsen was advised by a Greek member of the particular forces that they’re underneath authorities directions to drive again the boats
We introduced the findings from our analysis to the Greek coast guard. It responded that its workers labored “tirelessly with the utmost professionalism, a robust sense of duty and respect for human life and elementary rights,” including that they “totally complied with the nation’s worldwide obligations.”
It added: “It must be emphasised that between 2015 and 2024, the Greek Coast Guard rescued 250,834 refugees/migrants in 6,161 incidents at sea. The impeccable execution of this noble mission has been positively acknowledged by the worldwide neighborhood.”
The Greek Coast Guard has been that means earlier than criticized for his position within the largest migrant shipwreck within the Mediterranean in a decade. Greater than 600 individuals are feared lifeless after the Adriana sank within the demarcated Greek rescue space final June.
Greek officers have insisted that the boat was not in hassle and was safely on its strategy to Italy, and that due to this fact the coast guard didn’t try a rescue.
The Greek coast guard threw migrants overboard to their deaths, witnesses say
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