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Greek immigration: Border Violence Monitoring Network, Mobile Info Team and I Have Rights document detention and abuse [1]
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Date: 2023-02
When Fardin Hosseini arrived in Athens in August 2021, he thought he’d reached a place of safety. The 34-year-old had fled persecution in Iran, escaping by car through Turkey and on foot into Greece. He wanted to claim asylum. But despite trying “about 20 times” to register his claim through the Skype-based system in place at the time, he said he could not get through.
Around three weeks after their arrival, Hosseini and a friend were stopped by police. “They asked for our papers,” he said. “We told them we don’t have papers and have been trying to contact the asylum office, but they didn’t listen. They arrested us and we went to the police station. From there, they transferred us to Amygdaleza [detention centre].”
After Amygdaleza, Hosseini was transferred to Corinth detention centre. “It was hell,” he said. In Corinth, Hosseini said he witnessed guards removing detainees from rooms and beating them as “punishment” for arguments breaking out. Detainees would be taken to a “a guard room” that he said he could see from the window, and “when they came back, there were bruises all over [their bodies].”
He and other detainees were only allowed outside the room for four hours a day, including to use the bathroom. “It was a closed area,” Hosseini said. “For me, it was a jail. It was like Guantanamo [Bay].” When he asked why he was being held, he said police officers replied: “this is the law”.
Amygdaleza and Corinth are two of seven detention centres used in Greece to detain foreign nationals prior to their deportation. Approximately 2,800 people were held in these centres at the end of 2022, according to the Greek Council for Refugees. NGOs have described the system as “a black hole” – but the UK government has openly stated its intention to copy the Greek approach, saying last year that new arrivals would be “housed in accommodation centres like those in Greece”.
Hosseini was at the bottom of that hole for seven months and eight days. He said he continued to repeat his request for asylum throughout his detention, and received interview dates several times, but they were always pushed back. He had little choice but to wait.
Unlawful and violent practices
Three reports, released today by separate NGOs working in Greece, reveal that Hosseini’s experience of detention was far from unusual. The reports contain little-known details about immigration detention across Greece and have been published as part of a coordinated effort by the Border Violence Monitoring Network, Mobile Info Team, and I Have Rights.
In an exclusive preview seen by openDemocracy, the combined findings of these reports paint a picture of systemic detention and police violence against migrants in Greek detention facilities.
The Border Violence Monitoring Network (BVMN) found that 33 of 50 ex-detainees (65%) surveyed had experienced or witnessed violence by authorities while detained in Greece. A quarter of accounts mentioned the use of weapons including tasers by authorities and the use of violence as “punishment”. This includes people being beaten or kicked, at times by multiple officers or after having been strung up by their hands. The report’s authors say this evidence “may constitute torture or inhuman and degrading treatment,” which is prohibited by the European Convention on Human Rights.
These revelations come in the wake of a leaked report by the human rights chief at Frontex, the EU border agency. In the confidential document, he calls for the agency to stop operating in Greece due to serious rights abuses by Greek border guards, violent pushbacks and the separation of children from their families.
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[1] Url:
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-trafficking-and-slavery/it-was-hell-asylum-seekers-and-ngos-allege-abuse-in-greek-detention/
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