Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 18th of April 2023

Case name: 2023_04_18-Eastern Med - 882
Situation: 37 people including children, one person in need of an oxygen device and a paralyzed person stuck on an Island in the Evros river for over four days, decision of the European Court of Human Rights that the people have a right to asylum, finally taken by Greek Border Guards to Orestiada
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded Place of Incident: Eastern Med

Summary of the Case:

On the 18th of April Alarm Phone was contacted via email: "Distress call: We are trapped on the island in the Evros river. We have children and women. We are cut off from everything.
We die of cold and fear here. We have children and women. There is a sick person whose health condition is very bad and he passed out". We get in contact with the group, they tell us they were expelled from Turkey and therefore came to Greece. They would be sent back to Syria if they were pushed back to Turkey. We ask the Greek Council of Refugees for legal support and inform the Greek authorities about the group.
During the next days the people on the island told us that different armed and unarmed groups, that the people called "commandos" and "soldiers" appeared on the island and threatened and beat them with weapons and sticks, told them to go back. When we called the police station in Orestiada on the 19th of April they claimed not to know anything. In the early morning of April 20th we asked the people if they tried to call 112, they said yes, but noone responded, additionally they ran out of water. In the afternoon April 20th the people told us that the water level of Evros is rising and they are in acute fear of drowning on the island during the night.
In the morning of the 21st of April we are informed that the people were picked up by Greek authorities and are about to be transferred to the reception and identification center in Orestiada.

twitter: https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1516302536289959940