bad conditions of detention and risk to personal integrity and deportation of asylum seekers and refugees

The International Secretariat of the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) requests your URGENT intervention in the following situation in Greece.

Brief description of the situation

The International Secretariat of OMCT has been informed by Greek Helsinki Monitor, a member of the SOS-Torture Network, of the bad conditions of detention and risk to personal integrity and deportation of 43 asylum seekers and refugees from Iraq.

According to the information received, on 22 February 2007, 54 Iraqis refugees and asylum seekers were arrested and detained on the basis of illegal entry in the Greek Island of Chios. A few days later 13 of them belonging to families with small children were released and ordered to leave the country. The remaining 39 men and 2 women were kept in detention. In the meantime, on 18 January 2007, two other Iraqis refugees were arrested and detained initially on Samos Island.

According to the information, the 41 Iraqis intended to file asylum applications. For the first time though, on 29 March 2007, the police authorities gave them orders to leave the country but did not release them. Instead they escorted them via Athens to the Thessaloniki Transfer Center so as to deport them to Turkey in application of a bilateral protocol of re-admission. The two Iraqis from Samos had been transferred a few days earlier, on 31 March and 1 April 2007 respectively, at that Transfer Center. Upon their arrival in Thessaloniki, on 30 March 2007, the Iraqis said that they wanted to file asylum applications, but they were denied that right. A legal support team managed to see three of them and was reportedly informed that all wanted to file applications as they had left Iraq fleeing persecution for various religious, ethnic or political reasons. The lawyers reportedly informed the police in writing in the evening of 30 March 2007 and an oral assurance was allegedly given that all those wishing to file applications will be allowed to do this.

However, according to the information, at 7 am on 31 March 2007, the Iraqis were told to pack and board a bus that would leave at 8 am to take them the Greek-Turkish border. Seven of them who protested and refused to board the bus, insisting to file asylum applications, reported to have been beaten by a group of police officers. Upon being informed about these developments, the lawyers in Thessaloniki and related NGOs in Thessaloniki, Chios and Athens reportedly protested to various competent police authorities, who subsequently stopped the deportation.

According to the information, police authorities then took the 41 applications, plus the applications of the two Iraqis who were arrested on Samos Island and transferred them to the Thessaloniki Transfer Center. However, no interpreters were reportedly provided during the process and the “interviews” were conducted in English which only one of them could understand but not speak fluently and had to translate back and forth to the other detainees. Moreover, no doctors reportedly examined those who reported having been beaten.

According to the information, on 10 April 2007 the Secretary General of the Ministry of Public Order signed rejection decisions of all asylum applications. These latter allegedly all invariantly mentioned - that there were no elements indicating that the Geneva Convention (1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees) could be applied, as there was no evidence that the applicant was or -was in danger to be- persecuted from the authorities in his country for reasons of race, religion, nationality, social class or political convictions. The decisions were communicated on 11 April 2007 and the applicants have a 30-day deadline to appeal.

In the meantime, the volunteer lawyers reportedly filed objections to the detention of the Iraqis before the Administrative Court of Thessaloniki. Five of them were consequently released. The two Iraqis arrested on Samos Island were released as the three-month maximum detention period had elapsed. The 36 remaining individuals were not granted release and remain detained in the Alien's Division of the Thessaloniki Police, allegedly in very bad conditions as the Division's detention facilities are constructed for short term detention and for a much smaller number of detainees. The Iraqis have reportedly to sleep on mattresses on the floor in overcrowded cells; there is no possibility to walk outdoors even for a short period.

The International Secretariat of OMCT is gravely concerned for the physical and psychological integrity of the 43 Iraqis and in particular for the 36 detained. OMCT calls on the Greek Government to guarantee their integrity at all times. OMCT urges the authorities to fully implement the Council of Europe Anti-Torture Committee (CPT) recommendations to prevent inhuman and degrading conditions of detention of asylum seekers in Greece[1]. Furthermore, OMCT urges the authorities to release them and to guarantee that their asylum applications are reviewed in strict implementation of the February 2007 Revised UNHCR special directives on Iraqi refugees calling for granting refugee status or subsidiary protection (depending on the region they come from) to Iraqis asylum seekers in view of the prevailing situation in Iraq.

Action requested

Please write to the authorities in Greece urging them to:

1. Take all necessary measures to guarantee the physical and psychological integrity of all the 43 Iraqis refugees and asylum seekers in particular of the 36 detained;
2. Take all necessary measures to guarantee that their asylum applications are reviewed each one separately and individually in strict implementation with the Revised UNHCHR Directives and with the Geneva Convention relating to the Status of Refugees;
3. Order their immediate release in accordance with the Revised UNHCHR Directives, and in the spirit of the judge decisions that led to the release of five of them;
4. Order a thorough and impartial investigation into the allegations of ill-treatment, in order to identify all those responsible, bring them to trial and apply the civil penal and/or administrative sanctions as provided by law
5. Guarantee the respect of human rights and the fundamental freedoms throughout the country in accordance with national laws and international human rights standards.

Addresses

• Mr. Kostas Karamanlis, Prime Minister, Prime Minister’s Office at the Hellenic Parliament, Greek Parliament Blgd, Constitution Square, Athens / Greece, Fax: +30 210 3238129 , Email: Mail@primeminister.gr
• Ms. Ntora Bakogiani, Foreign Minister, Athens, Greece, Fax: 30 210 36 81 433, Email: gpap@mfa.gr
• Mr. Anastasios Papaligouras, Minister of Justice, Athens, Greece, Fax +30 2107489231
• Mr. Byron Polidoras, Minister of Public Order, Athens, Greece, Fax: + 30 210 6917944
• Mr. Giorgos Kaminis, Ombudsman for Human Rights, Fax 30 210 7289643
• Mr. Athanassio Dimoschakis, Chief of Greek Police, Fax: +30-2106923689
• H.E. Franciscos Verros, Ambassador, Permanent Mission of Greece to the United Nations in Geneva, Rue du Léman 4, 1201 Geneva, Switzerland, Email: mission.greece@ties.itu.int, Fax: +41 22 732.21.50

Please also write to the embassies of Greece in your respective country.

Geneva, 14 May 2007

Kindly inform us of any action undertaken quoting the code of this appeal in your reply.

[1] http://www.cpt.coe.int/documents/grc/2006-41-inf-eng.htm