Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 31th of August 2020

Case name: 20203108-AEG704

Situation: Greek coast guard takes away the motor of a boat with approximately travellers, Turkish coast guard brings the travellers back to Turkey

Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded

Place of Incident: Aegean Sea

Summary of the Case:

On 31th of August 2020 the Alarm Phone received a call from a man on a boat with approximately 40 people, among them pregnant women and children. He said a Greek ship was next to them and told them to go back. He sent a GPS position located sharply in Turkish waters. In a second phone call the travellers were screaming and saying water was coming into the boat and in further calls they reported that the other boat was creating waves on purpose. They were afraid to drown.

At 03:37h CEST an email informing about the boat in distress was sent to Turkish and Greek authorities, also to authorities on the island of Simi, where the ship was close by. At 03:50h CEST we also called authorities at Simi, but as they only spoke Greek we called Rhodos and talked to an officer who was already informed about the boat and its position but who also made clear they wouldn´t react as it was in Turkish waters.

At 04:34h CEST we received another call from the travellers screaming and telling people from the Greek boat were taking their engine away and insulting them. They urgently asked for rescue and we called the Turkish coast guard. The officer said a boat would arrive there within an hour. At 8:52h CEST we got confirmation that the people were at the police station back in Turkey.

Later we learned from a testimony of a survivor that two different attacks happened to them, they had decided to try a second time to reach a place of safety in Greece, after having been attacked already once near Simi. The survivor told us:

“It was the night from Sunday to Monday. We tried to reach the island of Simi. On our boat we were 41 people, all from Africa. I cannot say exactly the number of women and of men, but two of the women were pregnant. There were also 3 kids with us. We were driving between 1 and 2 hours and when we reached the borderline there was a huge ship of the coastguard. They were armed and they told us to stop. Our engine stopped then and could not be restarted. We asked them for help but they only shouted "go back, go back!". They started to create big waves to make our boat return backwards by itself. The engine was anyway stopped and so they left us there and watched from a distance. We could then manage to restart the engine and we went backwards, towards Turkey.

Then we made a second try to reach Greece, we went towards Rhodes. Not far from Rhodes we were stopped again. This time there was a bigger boat. It stopped in a distance, so I could not see it clearly. It was still dark. They sent a smaller boat towards us. On this boat there were men with masks and arms. They looked like ninjas, all black. They attacked us. Shouting all the time on us. They had a stick and on this stick a knife. They sabotaged the engine. They held a light on us all the time, that’s why on the video it is difficult to see something. Another friend also made video, but they saw that he made it and they slapped him and took the phone and broke it and threw it in the sea. They don’t want us to prove their violence and to show it to the world. But another friend noted down the number they had on their boat: AE070.
The masked men attacked us also with violence. They shouted all the time in English on us: “Fuck your babies” “Fuck your mothers” “Shut up” Fuck you”. One of the pregnant women stood up, she wanted to show them that she is pregnant. She hoped for mercy. She was shouting louder the all the men to be seen and because she was in panic. But they just pushed her hard and she fell down. We were all afraid she will loose the baby. Fortunately when she went to hospital later in Turkey we found out that the baby in her belly is still alive.

In this attack our boat got also pierced. They again made waves and everyone was crying and panicking. They left us in the open sea. Finally I managed to call 112 and we reached the Turkish side. This was at 6:40h local time. After this it did not take too long and they rescued us back to Turkey. It was a bit later then 7 when they came and rescued us.

Life in Turkey is not easy. We cannot survive here and we face also discrimination.The Greeks treated us worse than animals. This has to be stopped. We need to find ways to show to the world what happens to us. Maybe this won’t help ourselves, but maybe this can help one day to stop this inhuman situation at the sea between Turkey and Greece.”