This memorandum, submitted to the United Nations
Committee Against Torture (the Committee) ahead of its upcoming review of
Greece, highlights areas of concern that Human Rights Watch hopes will inform
the Committee’s consideration of the Greek government’s (the government)
compliance with the International Convention against Torture and Other Cruel,
Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (the Convention). It contains
information on Greece’s treatment of migrants and asylum seekers that is
inconsistent with the Convention and proposes issues that Committee members may
wish to raise with the government.
Human Rights Watch has closely monitored the human
rights situation in Greece and, in particular, the treatment of migrants and
asylum seekers over the past ten years. As part of this work, we have
documented violations against refugees, asylum seekers, and migrants, including
those with disabilities and unaccompanied migrant children, and have produced
reports and other documents describing our research findings.
We welcome the opportunity to provide information to
the Committee ahead of its review of Greece’s compliance with the Convention.
We recommend that the Committee members ask the Greek government to provide
information that demonstrates how its legal and policy reforms have contributed
to concrete improvements in the treatment of migrants generally, as well as
asylum seekers, unaccompanied migrant children, and other vulnerable groups.
We strongly believe that sustained monitoring and
pressure on the Greek government by the UN and other rights bodies are crucial
to ensure that the rights of groups that are at higher risks, such as persons
with disabilities and migrants, are fully respected.
Detention of Unaccompanied Migrant Children
Asylum-seeking and migrant children who are
unaccompanied are often detained while authorities search for shelter
facilities for them. A lack of shelter space has led to the prolonged detention
of children in police station cells, pre-removal centers, and hotspots on the
island. Detained children are forced to live in unsanitary conditions, often
alongside adults they do not know, and can be abused and ill-treated by police.
Children are often unable to receive medical treatment, psychological
counselling, education, or legal aid. Few even know why they’re detained or how
long they will be behind bars and have little chance of challenging their
detention.[1] Such practices are inconsistent with articles 11
and 16 of the Convention.
These practices are also inconsistent with the
principle of respect for the best interests of children. Emphasizing “the harm
inherent in any deprivation of liberty and the negative impact that immigration
detention can have on children’s physical and mental health and on their
development,” the Committee on the Rights of the Child has called in its Joint
General Comment Nos. 4/23 for any deprivation of liberty based on a child’s
migration status to be “prohibited by law and its abolishment ensured in policy
and practice.”[2]
In two separate rulings, the first issued at the end
of February 2019 and the second in June, the European Court of Human Rights
condemned Greece for the abusive practice of detaining unaccompanied children
in police stations. In both cases, the court ruled that the detention in police
stations of the children violated their right to liberty, and that conditions
there exposed them to degrading treatment.[3] We are particularly concerned with the fact that since
the February 2019 ruling, incidents of such detention have increased,
suggesting that the government is not taking reasonable steps to address it.[4]
The detention of unaccompanied children due to a
shortage of sufficient and adequate accommodation is a chronic problem in
Greece; a 2008 Human Rights Watch report called the routine detention of
unaccompanied children “a fundamental dysfunction at the heart of the…Greek
immigration and social welfare systems.” Human Rights Watch continued to
document the detention of children in closed facilities on Greek islands in
2015 and 2016 and since then has monitored the situation closely.
According to the National Center for Social Solidarity
(EKKA), the government authority responsible for managing the placement of
unaccompanied children in shelters, as of May 31 there were 3,835 unaccompanied
migrant children registered in Greece. According to the same data, an estimated
123 children were locked in police stations awaiting transfer. Hundreds of
other unaccompanied children, EKKA reported, were held in special sections in
the hotspots on the Greek islands, while over 1,000 have been reported as
living in informal/insecure housing conditions such as living temporarily in
apartments with others, living in squats, being homeless and moving frequently
between different types of accommodation.[5]
Under a Greek law adopted in April 2016, unaccompanied
children can be detained pending referral to a dedicated reception facility for
a maximum of 25 days, though detention can be prolonged by a further 20 days if
the child cannot be transferred to such a facility due to exceptional
circumstances, such as a large number of arrivals of unaccompanied children.
This law improves upon the previous framework, which provided no clear time
limit, but does not provide the necessary safeguards to prevent unjustified
prolonged detention.[6]
Human Rights Watch has found that children are often
detained for longer than these already excessive periods.
We urge the Committee to call on the Greek government
to:
- End any
practice of automatic detention of unaccompanied children as well as the
deprivation of children’s liberty based solely on their migration status;
- Make individual
assessments of the needs of each child based on their best interests to
determine arrangements for their care and protection;
- Increase
the number of spaces in existing long-term care facilities for
unaccompanied children, create new facilities to the level required to
ensure placements for all unaccompanied children in the country, while
implementing the new national, government-run foster family system;
- Ensure,
while moving expeditiously to increase capacity in long-term care
facilities and the foster family system, any period of “protective
custody” in detention facilities is employed only in truly exceptional
circumstances. In particular:
- amend
legislation to shorten significantly the maximum amount of time
unaccompanied children may be detained in protective custody, and ensure
that children are never detained in excess of the time permitted under
law;
- amend
legislation to allow children to challenge the lawfulness of their
detention with the assistance of a legal aid lawyer;
- urgently
improve detention conditions in police-run facilities and ensure that
children in detention have access to interpretation services, information
about the purpose of their detention, counseling, legal aid, and
educational and recreational materials.
Treatment of Asylum Seekers in Northern Greece
During visits to three government-run centers holding
asylum-seekers and migrants in Thessaloniki (Diavata) and at the land-border
with Turkey in the Evros region (the Fylakio pre-removal detention center and
the Fylakio Reception and Identification Center), in May 2018, Human Rights
Watch found reception and detention conditions that we believe are inconsistent
with Convention articles 10, 11, 12, 13 and 16.
Human Rights Watch interviewed 49 asylum seekers and
migrants in the three facilities, as well as Greek authorities and facility
personnel. All three facilities lacked adequate access to health care,
including mental health care, and support for at-risk people, including women
traveling alone, pregnant women, new mothers, and survivors of sexual violence.
The lack of interpreters hindered essential communication. Asylum seekers and
migrants said they did not know why they were being held. Interviewees reported
verbal abuse by police, and two said they witnessed police physically abusing
others.[7]
Conditions were especially poor at the Fylakio
pre-removal detention center, where Human Rights Watch researchers witnessed
asylum seekers being held in dark, dank cells, with overpowering odors in the
corridors. Female asylum seekers and migrants were being held with unrelated
males at both the pre-removal center and the reception and identification
center at Fylakio, where housing failed to meet such basic standards as having
toilets and locking doors.
Twelve women and two girls interviewed said they had
been locked in cells or enclosures for weeks, and in one case for nearly five
months, with men and boys they did not know. Four said they were the sole
females confined with dozens of men, in some cases with at least one male partner
or relative. Five women said they had severe psychological distress as a
result, including two who had suicidal thoughts. Other women and girls said
they experienced sleeplessness, anxiety, and other emotional and psychological
distress, in part due to fear of confinement with unrelated men.[8]
Ten asylum seekers and migrants said police at the
Fylakio pre-removal detention center and reception and identification center
mistreated them, including through verbal abuse, humiliation, and violation of
privacy. Two said they witnessed police hit other people being held in the
facilities.[9]
Human Rights Watch researchers heard police at both
facilities make derogatory comments about asylum seekers and migrants and
address them aggressively.[10]
We urge the Committee
to:
- Request
specific information on the number of disciplinary and/or criminal
investigations into law enforcement officials for allegations of
ill-treatment of migrants in 2017, 2018 and 2019 across the country, as
well as in the Evros region, and the number of cases in which sanctions
have been imposed as well as the nature of these sanctions;
- Call on
the Greek government immediately to improve detention conditions at the
Fylakio pre-removal detention center, and the Fylakio Reception and
Identification Center (RIC), including by taking immediate steps to
ensure:
- sanitary,
hygienic conditions and access to medical care, including reproductive
and maternal health care;
- the
security and protection of women and children. Women traveling alone and
unaccompanied children should have separate, secure sleeping areas, and
families should be provided with secure sleeping, toilet, and bathing
facilities separate from those for single men;
- availability
of trained male and female interpreters to allow for communication
between facility staff and migrants and asylum seekers, including
regarding health and protection concerns.
- Take
measures to mitigate risks for female migrants and asylum seekers in
police-run facilities at the Evros region and at the Fylakio RIC,
including providing separate, secure shelter and bathroom facilities, for
those traveling without adult male family members, making female staff and
female interpreters available.
Collective Expulsions
Since the Committee’s last review of Greece in 2012
and its recommendations to the Greek government to ensure full protection from
refoulement, there has been mounting evidence documented by nongovernmental
organizations that Greek border guards engage in collective expulsions and
“pushbacks” of migrants and asylum seekers at the borders with Turkey, in some
cases involving ill-treatment. Such practices are inconsistent with articles 3,
10, 11, 12, 13, and 16 of the Convention.
Increasing numbers of migrants, including asylum
seekers from Turkey, have attempted to cross the Evros River, which forms a
natural border between Greece and Turkey, since April 2018. A total of 18,014
people crossed through Evros in 2018, compared to 6,592 in 2017. Between
January 1 and June 23, 2019, a total of 5,307 people had crossed the border via
the Evros river, according to UNHCR data.[11]
Human Rights Watch interviewed 26 asylum seekers and
other migrants in Greece in May 2018, and in Turkey in October and November
2018. They are from Afghanistan, Iraq, Morocco, Pakistan, Syria, Tunisia, and
Yemen, and include families traveling with children. They described 24
incidents of pushbacks across the Evros River from Greece to Turkey.[12]
The 24 incidents described demonstrate a pattern that
points to an established and well-coordinated practice of pushbacks. Most of
the incidents share three key features: initial capture by local police
patrols, detention in police stations or informal locations close to the border
with Turkey, and handover from identifiable law enforcement bodies to
unidentifiable paramilitaries who would carry out the pushback to Turkey across
the Evros River, at times violently.
Most incidents took place between April and November
2018. All of those interviewed reported hostile or violent behavior by Greek
police and unidentified forces wearing uniforms and masks without recognizable
insignia. Twelve said police or members of the unidentified forces accompanying
the police stripped them of their possessions, including their money and
personal identification, which were often destroyed. Seven said police or
unidentified forces took their clothes or shoes and forced them back to Turkey
in their underwear, sometimes at night in freezing temperatures.
Abuse included beatings with hands and batons,
kicking, and, in one case, the use of what appeared to be a stun gun. In
another case, a Moroccan man said a masked man dragged him by his hair, forced
him to kneel on the ground, held a knife to his throat, and subjected him to a
mock execution. Others pushed back include a pregnant 19-year-old woman from
Afrin, Syria, and a woman from Afghanistan who said Greek authorities took away
her two young children’s shoes.
Accounts gathered by Human Rights Watch are consistent
with the findings of other nongovernmental groups, intergovernmental
agencies, and media reports.[13] UNHCR, the United
Nations Refugee Agency, has raised similar concerns.[14] In a June 2018 report,
the Council of Europe’s (CoE) Committee for the Prevention of
Torture said it has received “several consistent and credible allegations
of pushbacks by boat from Greece to Turkey at the Evros River border by masked
Greek police and border guards or (para-)military commandos.”[15] In November,
the CoE human rights commissioner called on Greece to investigate
allegations, in light of information pointing to “an established practice.”[16]
We urge the Committee
to:
- Request
information on disciplinary and criminal investigations by Greek
authorities into all recorded incidents of collective expulsions,
pushbacks, ill-treatment on Greece’s land borders with Turkey, as well as
about steps taken to end and prevent the recurrence of such incidents and
ensure that all measures to identify irregular migrants at Greece’s land
and sea borders with Turkey are conducted in full compliance with human
rights and refugee law.
Asylum Seekers Trapped on the Aegean Islands
Since 2015, Human Rights Watch has conducted numerous
research missions on the islands of Lesbos, Chios, Samos, Kos and Leros, the
locations where most asylum seekers enter Greece. We have consistently found
that thousands of migrants and asylum seekers contained on the Aegean islands,
most of them living in the so-called refugee “hotspots” (Reception and
Identification Centers or RICs), face appalling reception conditions
inconsistent with article 16 of the Convention.
Under a containment policy in place since the March
2016 EU-Turkey agreement, Greek authorities confine asylum seekers on the
Aegean islands until their asylum claims are adjudicated, a process that can
take months or even years. Members of vulnerable groups—including pregnant
women, older people, unaccompanied children, single parents with children,
victims of torture or sexual or gender-based violence, and people with
disabilities—and people eligible to be reunited with family members already in
the EU are supposed to be exempt from the policy, but delays in vulnerability
assessment procedure and the lack of accommodation on the mainland mean
thousands of eligible individuals and families remain trapped on the island for
months.
In addition, Human Rights Watch has previously
documented that many vulnerable groups fall through the cracks in the
identification process, and that the lack of prompt transfers put vulnerable
people, including people with invisible
disabilities and children, at higher risk of abuse and violation of
their rights.[17]
According to government data, by June 18, 2019 there
were 16,840 asylum seekers on all five Aegean islands, with 13,253 living in
the hotspot facilities designed to host at a maximum 6,438 people. At present,
the situation is particularly critical in the hotspots on Samos and Lesbos,
where as of June 18 a total of more than 8,843 people are living in facilities
intended for just 3,748.[18]
Human Rights Watch research has found hotspot
facilities to be severely overcrowded most of the time, with significant
shortages of basic shelter and unsanitary, unhygienic conditions. People with
disabilities were often unable to access basic services, such as water,
sanitation and hygiene facilities. Long lines for poor quality food,
mismanagement, and lack of information contribute to a chaotic and volatile
atmosphere.[19]
Human Rights Watch has also heard consistent accounts
from residents in the hotspots of the police’s routine failure to protect
people during frequent incidents of violence. Camp residents have said that
fights occur daily, particularly in the food lines, with no police
intervention.
Despite a police order that directs all police working
with refugees and migrants to ensure protection and security for women and
children, women and girls interviewed in November 2017 at the Moria hotspot, on
Lesbos island, described pervasive sexual harassment and a persistent sense of
insecurity, and said authorities are unresponsive to their complaints and do
not take adequate action to ensure their safety.[20]
Women in Moria described being sexually harassed
routinely, particularly when going to and from or while using the camp
bathrooms. Human Rights Watch found that bathrooms and showers do not have
doors with working locks and/or adequate lighting, as per international
standards on protection from and prevention of gender-based violence. Women and
girls also said they feel particularly exposed to the threat of sexual violence
during episodes of fighting between other migrants/asylum-seekers in the
centers.[21]
Pregnant women also told Human Rights Watch about lack
of medical care or support, such as appropriate shelter and extra blankets. For
example, two women who were nine months pregnant were sleeping on the ground in
tents. Neither woman had received comprehensive pre-natal medical care or had
information about whom to contact when she went into labor or where she could
deliver her baby.
These findings echo what dozens of other female asylum
seekers and representatives of agencies that provide aid to migrants told Human
Rights Watch about conditions in the Greek hotspots, citing harassment, the
threat of gender-based violence, and health risks, during earlier visits in
2016 and 2017.
Throughout our research missions, we have also
documented the deteriorating psychological and emotional wellbeing of asylum
seekers and migrants—including incidents of self-harm, suicide attempts,
aggression, anxiety, and depression—caused by the Greek policy of “containing”
them on islands often in horrifying conditions.[22]
With severe overcrowding still persistent at this
writing, there has been little or no improvement in the situation.
We urge the Committee to call on the Greek government
to:
- End the
containment policy that exposes individuals to inhuman and degrading
conditions, cease holding asylum seekers in camps on the Aegean Islands
and transfer them to appropriate facilities or housing on the mainland,
and ensure sufficient and adequate accommodation and services on the
mainland;
- Urgently
improve living conditions for asylum seekers on the Aegean islands that
exposes them to inhuman and degrading treatment and protect the health and
safety of those who remain, including by ensuring accessible, adequate and
secure shelter, safe drinking water and sanitation, an enabling
environment for good hygiene, pre-natal, maternal and other necessary
health care, and protection;
- Ensure
there is enough separate, secure shelter for all women and girls traveling
alone, and separate, safe, secure, physically accessible, and hygienic
toilets and bathing facilities that ensure privacy and dignity for men and
women. Camp management should provide adequate lighting and identify and
monitor high-risk areas;
- Ensure
all asylum seekers and migrants can access protection and services without
discrimination;
- Ensure
that people with disabilities and other at-risk groups, including
children, have equal access to assistance provided in refugee and migrant
centers and camps—including water and sanitation services, food
distribution, shelter, and health care including mental health and
psychosocial support;
- The
Greek government should issue clear guidance to field staff on identifying
and registering people with disabilities, including disabilities that are
not readily identifiable, such as intellectual disabilities or mental
health conditions;
- In the
long-term, the Greek authorities, with the support of the EU and the
UNHCR, should end encampment for everyone and provide accommodation in the
community. Living in camps can perpetuate the trauma of displacement and
increase other critical protection risks, including physical and sexual
violence and health concerns.
[3] European Court of Human Rights, First
Section, H.A. and Others vs. Greece, no. 19951/16, available in French at http://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng?i=001-191278 (accessed on July 1,
2019), and European Court of Human Rights, First Section, SH.D. and
Others vs. Greece, Austria, Croatia, Hungary, Northern Macedonia, Serbia and
Slovenia, no. 14165/16, available in French at http://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng?i=001-193610(accessed on July 1, 2019).
[6] Law on the organization and operation of the
Asylum Service, the Appeals Authority, the Reception and Identification
Service, the establishment of the General Secretariat for Reception, the
transposition into Greek legislation of the provisions of Directive 2013/32/EC,
No. 4375 of 2016, http://www.refworld.org/docid/573ad4cb4.html (accessed July 1, 2019)
art. 46(10)(b) (Law on Reception). Prior to the law’s enactment, in April 2016,
there were no set time limits on detention of children in protective custody.
[15] Council of Europe Committee for the Prevention
of Torture, Preliminary observations made by the delegation of the
European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading
Treatment or Punishment (CPT) which visited Greece from 10 to 19 April 2018,
Strasbourg June 1, 2018, https://rm.coe.int/16808afaf6 (accessed July 1, 2019).
[19] Human Rights Watch report, Greece:
Refugee “Hotspots” Unsafe, Unsanitary, Women, Children Fearful, Unprotected;
Lack Basic Shelter, May 19, 2016, https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/05/19/greece-refugee-hotspots-unsafe-unsanitary; Human Rights Watch
report, Greece: Dire Conditions for Asylum Seekers on Lesbos, Mainland
Space Shortage Bars Transfer of Vulnerable People, November 21,
2018, https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/11/21/greece-dire-conditions-asylum-seekers-lesbos.
[22] Human Rights Watch report, EU/Greece: Asylum Seekers’
Silent Mental Health Crisis - Identify Those Most at Risk; Ensure Fair Hearings,
July 12, 2017, https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/07/12/eu/greece-asylum-seekers-silent-mental-health-crisis.
4/7/2019
https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/07/04/human-rights-watch-submission-united-nations-committee-against-torture-greece
