12/11: 50 people near Tychero in Greece, pushed back to Turkey

13.11.2020 / 19:55 / Aegean Sea

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – November 12th 2020

Case name: 2020_11_12_AEG721

Situation: 50 people near Tychero in Greece, pushed back to Turkey

Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded

Place of Incident: Aegean Sea

Summary of Case

On Thursday, November 12, we received another distress call from the Evros region. 50 people were calling us from the village of Tychero. They were afraid, as Greek border guards had stolen their phones and told them that they would soon be pushed back to Turkey. Upon investigating the location they shared with us (41.03586959838867, 26.291399002075195 at 10:00 CET) on Google maps, we found that it was the Tychero Border Guard Station itself, a location which appears in reports of previous pushbacks available online. However, when we called the station, the officers on duty told us that they did not know anything about the group. Soon afterwards, we lost contact to the people. Around 19:00 CET, relatives informed us that the group had been pushed back to Turkey and were at Edirne bus station on their way back to Istanbul. We examined footage the people shared from the place they were detained and found similarities to previous visualization of the Border Guard station in Tychero by Forensic Architecture.

To see the videos we received from inside the Tychero Border Guard station, click here:.

Twitter Chronology

13.01 CET https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1326858093108600834 and https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1326858094463377409

Last update: 18:52 Mar 22, 2021

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