ECtHR: Greece condemned for systematic pushbacks
In the beginning of January 2025, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) issued two landmark decisions regarding a systematic practice of pushbacks of migrants in the Mediterranean sea by Greece, which might significantly affect migrants protection in Europe.
The ECtHR revealed that international protection seekers had been “pushed back” from Greece to Türkiye, causing violations of their human rights, more specifically violent pushbacks of refugees and migrants at the Greek border. In some instances, individuals were secretly detained in the Evros region before being forcibly towed into Turkish waters in humanely unacceptable manners.
In the case of A.R.E. v. Greece, the European Court of Human Rights determined that Greece had violated international law by expelling a Turkish national without first assessing the potential risks she faced upon return to Turkey. Furthermore, the Court concluded that the detention prior to her expulsion was illegal and consisted in a form of enforced disappearance. The judgment also highlighted a significant flaw within the Greek legal system: the lack of effective remedies for the human rights violations suffered by the individual.
In the case of G.R.J. v. Greece, an Afghan unaccompanied minor who claimed he was forcibly removed from a Greek refugee camp and pushed back into the Aegean Sea by Greek officers, the European Court of Human Rights found his application inadmissible. While the Court acknowledged the challenges in gathering evidence against secret state actions like pushbacks, it determined that the applicant had failed to provide sufficient proof of his alleged experience. This decision, which set a high evidentiary bar for victims of pushbacks, has raised concerns about creating further obstacles to accountability for these human rights violations.
Different NGOs, such as ECCHR, PRO ASYL, and Refugee Support Aegean submitted a third party intervention (TPI) to the European Court of Human Rights in July 2022. This intervention highlighted the lack of accountability for these human rights violations within Greece.