02/07: 14 travellers at the Turkish-Greek landborder, safe arrival in Greece

03.07.2018 / 22:15 / Turkey - Greece land border

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 2nd of July 2018

Case name: 2018_07_02-AEG403
Situation: 14 travellers at the Turkish-Greek landborder, safe arrival in Greece
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded

Place of Incident: Aegean Sea

Summary of the Case:

On Monday, 2nd of July, at 10:54pm CEST, we were alerted to a group of travellers in Evros river border zone, asking for assistance. At 11pm we reached the group. They were 14 people, among them women and babies. We received their GPS position at 11:25pm. At 00:02am we received a list of the names of the travellers. They decided to stay at the given position overnight and asked us to contact the authorities the next morning. At 6:33am we tried to contact the group again but couldn’t establish a connection. At 8:02am we called UNHCR Athens, but couldn’t pass our information. At 8:34am we called the local police station. They passed us a second number to call, but we couldn’t establish a proper communication with the responding officer. We sent an Email to UNHCR Athens with the names of the people and the relevant information. At 10:00am we managed to speak to someone from UNHCR Athens office and asked them to send the local police to assist the travellers, but they refused to get involved. We still couldn’t establish a connection to the travellers.
At 10.15am we called the Regional Centre for Integrated Border Management and informed them about the group. In the ongoing we tried to alert various local police stations, but in case we managed to establish communication, we were only referred to other authorities. At 11:15am, the police in Alexandropolis informed us that the group had been found, but we should call one hour later for final confirmation. At 1pm we tried to get the final confirmation from Alexandropolis but were referred to another police Headquarter. We called the Headquarter, but they couldn’t confirm that the group had been assisted. We sent another Email to the authorities requesting information. The travellers had been unreachable since the morning. At 1:56pm we called UNHCR Athens again, but they couldn’t provide any information regarding the group.
At 4:28pm we reached the police in Alexandropolis that confirmed the assistance of the 14 travellers.

Credibility:

Border police patrols
While the exact location of patrols is of course constantly changing, this line indicates the approximate boundary routinely patrolled by border guards’ naval assets. In the open sea, it usually correspond to the outer extent of the contiguous zone, the area in which “State may exercise the control necessary to prevent infringement of its customs, fiscal, immigration or sanitary laws” (UNCLOS, art. 33). Data source: interviews with border police officials.
Coastal radars
Approximate radar beam range covered by coastal radars operating in the frame of national marine traffic monitoring systems. The actual beam depends from several different parameters (including the type of object to be detected). Data source: Finmeccanica.
Exclusive Economic Zone
Maritime area beyond and adjacent to the territorial sea in which the coastal state exercises sovereign rights for the purposes of exploring and exploiting, conserving and managing the natural resources, whether living or non-living, the seabed and its subsoil and the superjacent waters. Its breadth is 200 nautical miles from the straight baselines from which the territorial sea is measured (UNCLOS, Arts. 55, 56 and 57). Data source: Juan Luis Suárez de Vivero, Atlas of the European Seas and Oceans
Frontex operations
Frontex has, in the past few years, carried out several sea operations at the maritime borders of the EU. The blue shapes indicate the approximate extend of these operations. Data source: Migreurop Altas.
Mobile phone coverage
Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) network coverage. Data source: Collins Mobile Coverage.
Oil and gas platforms
Oil and gas platforms in the Mediterranean. Data source:
Search and Rescue Zone
An area of defined dimensions within which a given state is has the responsibility to co-ordinate Search and Rescue operations, i.e. the search for, and provision of aid to, persons, ships or other craft which are, or are feared to be, in distress or imminent danger. Data source: IMO availability of search and rescue (SAR) services - SAR.8/Circ.3, 17 June 2011.
Territorial Waters
A belt of sea (usually extending up to 12 nautical miles) upon which the sovereignty of a coastal State extends (UNCLOS, Art. 2). Data source: Juan Luis Suárez de Vivero, Atlas of the European Seas and Oceans