Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 20th of September 2022

Case name: 2022_09_20 -Eastern Med - 1013

Situation: Pushback to Turkey

Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded

Place of Incident: Eastern Med

Summary of the Case: 3 people pushed back to Turkey at the Landborder

In the afternoon of the 20th of September 2022, we are alerted to a group of three people near the land border in Evros. One person in the group is vomiting blood and is extremely unwell. They do not have a phone and we are never able to make direct contact with them. We alert the Greek authorities, UNHCR and other NGOs, and inform them of their location, their need for urgent medical assistance, and their wish to claim asylum. The next morning, we call Didimoticho border guard station, who tells us to call the local police station. We call UNHCR Athens who do not help, and we call the UNHCR protection unit at Thessaloniki who says they will forward the emails to the relevant authorities. We also call Alexandroupouli Security and Immigration office who tell us they did not receive our email, won’t accept information over the phone, and will not provide us with any information. We continue to call the authorities and UNHCR but get no further information. We later managed to contact the relative who alerted us to the group, and they told us the people were beaten badly and pushed back to Turkey.

20.45 - https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1572293632073367552