Over the last three years 38.000 people have been pushed back in the Aegean Sea in 1.500 cases by Greek authorities, despite the mounting evidence against them, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, continue to deny Greek involvement in these atrocities.
Evidence is recorded by UN bodies, NGOs and investigative journalists. However, Mitsotakis refuted the ever mounting evidence of systematic pushbacks, saying Greece fully respects fundamental rights and doubling down on often repeated claims that such allegations are orchestrated by Turkey.
UN bodies and human rights groups have repeatedly condemned Greece’s illegal practice of pushing back refugees, saying it violates human rights and international law by endangering the lives of vulnerable people, including women and children.
Pushbacks are contrary to international refugee protection agreements, which dictate that people should not be expelled or returned to a country where their life and safety might be in danger due to their race, religion, nationality, or membership in a social or political group.
A concerning trend in Greece of criminalisation of civil society organizations, who continue to expose Greek authorities, and the use of smear campaigns to restrict migrant rights defenders from operating.
So far almost 800 life rafts has been picked up by Turkish coast guard in the Aegean Sea, carrying over 13.000 men, women and children, who have been illegally removed from Greek islands by authorities.
We have put together videos from 170 life raft cases, filmed by the Turkish coast guard, from the last year, and decided to publish them in a uncensored video. The video is over 90 minutes, and shows only some of the life raft cases in the last year, if we had published them all the video would be over 6 hours.
How this have been allowed to continue for all these years, still ongoing every single day, supported by the European Border and Coast Guard Agency FRONTEX, funded by the European Commission, is reprehensible, these are the “European values” we are trying to protect.
European politicians have for far to long been looking the other way, while these crimes against humanity have been performed in our name, at our borders. They are even to this day, still debating “if” this is actually taking place, and if so, who is responsible.
The “if” and “who” has already been documented and proven without a doubt, the evidence is overwhelming, now it’s time to put the people responsible on trial for crimes against humanity, and restore our good name and reputation, our values.