Greek border guards face fresh allegations of illegal migrant pushbacks

Greece's coastguard has been blamed for the drowning of at the very least two migrants amid additional allegations of unlawful pushbacks.

A Cameroonian asylum seeker has accused Greek authorities of throwing him into the ocean final September off the coast of the island of Samos.

The person -- recognized as Ibrahim -- mentioned two different males had been additionally solid overboard throughout a deportation operation to Turkey.

He instructed European media that Greek coastguards beat them "with their fists" earlier than "throwing them overboard" with no lifeboat or lifejacket.

The our bodies of the 2 different males -- from Cameroon and the Ivory Coast -- had been later discovered by Turkish authorities and boats.

Ibrahim -- who has since filed an asylum utility in Greece -- mentioned he survived after managing to swim to the Turkish coast within the Aegean Sea.

He instructed reporters that he had boarded a dinghy alongside 35 others in Turkey, earlier than arriving on the jap Greek island.

There, a number of members of the group had been subjected to violence by Greek coastguards and had their cell phones and cash confiscated, in response to a number of sources.

The three males had been later compelled to board a ship earlier than being thrown into the ocean, Ibrahim mentioned.

The Worldwide Group for Migration’s issued an announcement on Friday, saying it was “alarmed by mounting migrant deaths and steady stories of pushbacks on the EU border between Greece and Turkey.”

NGOs have repeatedly accused Greece of ill-treatment in migrant camps, unlawful actions at its border with Turkey, and denying migrants the best to asylum procedures.

Underneath European and worldwide human rights regulation, individuals can't be returned to a rustic the place they might face torture, punishment or hurt.

Athens has denied the allegations of unlawful pushbacks and has labelled the claims "pretend information" and "Turkish propaganda".

"Within the absence of motion by the Turkish authorities, the Greek Coast Guard continues to avoid wasting the lives of hundreds of males, girls and kids at sea yearly," mentioned Greek Migration and Asylum Minister Notis Mitarachi.

"Between 2015 and 2021, the Hellenic Coast Guard rescued greater than 230,000 third-country nationals at risk at sea," he mentioned in a assertion.

"Greece protects the exterior borders of the European Union, in full compliance with worldwide regulation and in full respect of the constitution of elementary rights".

Nineteen migrants had been discovered frozen to dying close to the Greek border earlier this month, main Ankara guilty Greece for the tragedy.

"Greece shouldn't be towards authorized immigration," mentioned Notis Mitarachi. "We're towards traffickers and all those that exploit human struggling, both for financial or political functions."

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