LONDON
\nGreek security forces are robbing and stripping asylum seekers before turning them over to third-country nationals to be expelled across the Turkish border, according to Human Rights Watch.
\nIn a 29-page report published on Thursday, HRW urged the European Commission to commence legal proceedings against the Greek government for its treatment of asylum seekers and use of proxies in \u201cillegal\u201d pushbacks at its borders.
\n\u201cGreece welcomes Ukrainians as \u2018real refugees\u2019 but conducts cruel pushbacks on Afghans and others fleeing war and violence,\u201d said Bill Frelick, HRW\u2019s refugee and migrant rights director.
\n\u201cThis double standard is a mockery of purported shared European values of equality, rule of law, and human dignity.
\n\u201cThe Commission should urgently open legal proceedings and hold the Greek government accountable for violating EU laws prohibiting collective expulsions.\u201d
\nCompounding claims of double standards was the assertion of Greece\u2019s Migration Minister Notis Mitarachi to Parliament on March 1 that Ukrainians are \u201creal refugees.\u201d
\nHe later took to Twitter to double down on his assertion, tweeting that he \u201crightly described them\u201d as \u201creal refugees \u2026 that is what international law says, not the ideologies of the left,\u201d inferring that those crossing the border with Turkey are not real refugees.
\nBased on the testimonies of 26 Afghan migrants and asylum seekers, the HRW report alleged that the violations were being committed by Greek police along the border with Turkey at the Evros River.
\nOf those interviewed, 23 said they were pushed back, with multiple testimonies that the process involved being stripped and robbed by police before being turned over to \u201cmasked men\u201d who dumped them in the \u201cfrigid\u201d river.
\nA 28-year-old former Afghan army commander and an 18-year-old Afghan told HRW that they had managed to talk with the masked men, identifying them as Arabs and Pakistanis.
\nThe 28-year-old said: \u201cThe boat driver said, \u2018We are \u2026 here doing this work for three months and then they give us \u2026 a document. With this, we can move freely inside Greece and then we can get a ticket for \u2026 another country\u2019.\u201d
\nGreek Maj. Gen. Dimitrios Mallios denied the report\u2019s allegations, saying: \u201cPolice agencies and their staff will continue to operate in a continuous, professional, lawful and prompt way, taking all necessary measures to effectively manage refugee\/migration flows.\u201d
\nThis is done \u201cin a manner that safeguards on the one hand the rights of the aliens and on the other hand the protection of citizens especially in the first line border regions,\u201d he added.
\nHRW said the Greek government \u201croutinely denies\u201d allegations of illegal pushbacks as either \u201cfake news\u201d or \u201cTurkish propaganda.\u201d
\nPushbacks violate multiple human rights norms, including the prohibition of collective expulsion under the European Convention on Human Rights, the right to due process in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the right to seek asylum under EU asylum law and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, and the principle of nonrefoulement under the 1951 Refugee Convention.
\nFrelick said: \u201cThere can be no denying that the Greek government is responsible for the illegal pushbacks at its borders and using proxies to carry out these illegal acts does not relieve it of any liability.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
LONDON Greek security forces are robbing and stripping asylum seekers before turning them over to third-country nationals to be expelled across the Turkish border, according to Human Rights Watch. In a 29-page report published on Thursday, HRW urged the European Commission to commence legal proceedings against the Greek government for its treatment of asylum seekers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-253609","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n