Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 8th of October 2021

Case name: 20211008-AEG832
Situation: 22 people pushed back south of Lesvos according to photographs and testimony Frontex was involved in the illegal pushback
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Aegean Sea

Summary of the Case:

At 17:14 CEST on the 8th of October our shift team was informed about a boat carrying 22 passengers including 6 women, 14 men and 3 children. They tried to reach the South of Lesvos. Later on it turned out they were 25 people on board. The boat was drifting in Turkish waters, after having been attacked, their engine removed, and towed with a rope to Turkish waters in an illegal push back by the Hellenic Coast Guard. They were left adrift in Turkish waters. They passed us their GPS-location (38.9921335,26.7340097) at 17:25 CEST. At the time, the boat was drifting South of Bademli. Our shift team alerted the Turkish coastguard who reported that they detected the boat and started a rescue operation at 18:16 CEST.

Days later we managed to get back in touch with the people from this boat. Testimony by one of the persons on board:

“On 8th of October we were on a boat trying to go from Greece to Turkey. We are refugees from Palestine and the Gaza Strip. We are trying to flee from hunger, siege and Israeli occupation and no one helps us. With us on the boat there were also refugees from Syria. All together 25 people, among us 9 women and 4 children. We were on our way to the island of Lesvos, to try to find a place of safety in Europe.
We saw a white boat in front of us. It was an Italian ship, I think. Someone made pictures, so you can see it. This white ship did not help us. They were standing in a distance from us and stayed there without helping us. We called by ourselves the Greek coastguard. When the Greek coastguard came this white ship went away from us in the direction of Greece. The Greek Coastguard approached us with a grey rubber boat. There were 3 men with masks on the rubber boat and others we did not see. They were armed. They asked us to remain silent. They cut off the ship's motor and ordered us again to shut up, and then they came to pull the boat. We were dragged with a rope towards Turkey. Then they left us there.
We contacted the Turkish coastguard, so that they would come to take us and also some groups to help us. Then we waited for about an hour and a half at sea before the Turks came.
My friends were beaten and had their luggage and phones stolen in the past – you want changes, but nothing changes these days. Our people of Palestine suffer from all kinds of oppression and injustice in our country. So we need to immigrate. Hope the future will be better. We hope that in the coming days, immigration will be more easy.”

By comparing photographs we could figure out that the white vessel the witness describes is the CP420, a vessel belonging to Guardia Costiera and part of the Frontex mission.