• Revealed: 2,000 refugee deaths linked to illegal EU pushbacks

    A Guardian analysis finds EU countries used brutal tactics to stop nearly 40,000 asylum seekers crossing borders

    EU member states have used illegal operations to push back at least 40,000 asylum seekers from Europe’s borders during the pandemic, methods being linked to the death of more than 2,000 people, the Guardian can reveal.

    In one of the biggest mass expulsions in decades, European countries, supported by EU’s border agency #Frontex, has systematically pushed back refugees, including children fleeing from wars, in their thousands, using illegal tactics ranging from assault to brutality during detention or transportation.

    The Guardian’s analysis is based on reports released by UN agencies, combined with a database of incidents collected by non-governmental organisations. According to charities, with the onset of Covid-19, the regularity and brutality of pushback practices has grown.

    “Recent reports suggest an increase of deaths of migrants attempting to reach Europe and, at the same time, an increase of the collaboration between EU countries with non-EU countries such as Libya, which has led to the failure of several rescue operations,’’ said one of Italy’s leading human rights and immigration experts, Fulvio Vassallo Paleologo, professor of asylum law at the University of Palermo. ‘’In this context, deaths at sea since the beginning of the pandemic are directly or indirectly linked to the EU approach aimed at closing all doors to Europe and the increasing externalisation of migration control to countries such as Libya.’’

    The findings come as the EU’s anti-fraud watchdog, Olaf, has launched an investigation into Frontex (https://www.euronews.com/2021/01/20/eu-migration-chief-urges-frontex-to-clarify-pushback-allegations) over allegations of harassment, misconduct and unlawful operations aimed at stopping asylum seekers from reaching EU shores.

    According to the International Organization for Migration (https://migration.iom.int/europe?type=arrivals), in 2020 almost 100,000 immigrants arrived in Europe by sea and by land compared with nearly 130,000 in 2019 and 190,000 in 2017.

    Since January 2020, despite the drop in numbers, Italy, Malta, Greece, Croatia and Spain have accelerated their hardline migration agenda. Since the introduction of partial or complete border closures to halt the outbreak of coronavirus, these countries have paid non-EU states and enlisted private vessels to intercept boats in distress at sea and push back passengers into detention centres. There have been repeated reports of people being beaten, robbed, stripped naked at frontiers or left at sea.

    In 2020 Croatia, whose police patrol the EU’s longest external border, have intensified systemic violence and pushbacks of migrants to Bosnia. The Danish Refugee Council (DRC) recorded nearly 18,000 migrants pushed back by Croatia since the start of the pandemic. Over the last year and a half, the Guardian has collected testimonies of migrants who have allegedly been whipped, robbed, sexually abused and stripped naked (https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/oct/21/croatian-police-accused-of-sickening-assaults-on-migrants-on-balkans-tr) by members of the Croatian police. Some migrants said they were spray-painted with red crosses on their heads by officers who said the treatment was the “cure against coronavirus” (https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/may/28/they-made-crosses-on-our-heads-refugees-report-abuse-by-croatian-police).

    According to an annual report released on Tuesday by the Border Violence Monitoring Network (BVMN) (https://www.borderviolence.eu/annual-torture-report-2020), a coalition of 13 NGOs documenting illegal pushbacks in the western Balkans, abuse and disproportionate force was present in nearly 90% of testimonies in 2020 collected from Croatia, a 10% increase on 2019.

    In April, the Guardian revealed how a woman from Afghanistan was allegedly sexually abused (https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/apr/07/croatian-border-police-accused-of-sexually-assaulting-afghan-migrant) and held at knifepoint by a Croatian border police officer during a search of migrants on the border with Bosnia.

    “Despite the European Commission’s engagement with Croatian authorities in recent months, we have seen virtually no progress, neither on investigations of the actual reports, nor on the development of independent border monitoring mechanisms,” said Nicola Bay, DRC country director for Bosnia. “Every single pushback represents a violation of international and EU law – whether it involves violence or not.”

    Since January 2020, Greece has pushed back about 6,230 asylum seekers from its shores, according to data from BVMN. The report stated that in 89% of the pushbacks, “BVMN has observed the disproportionate and excessive use of force. This alarming number shows that the use of force in an abusive, and therefore illicit, way has become a normality […]

    “Extremely cruel examples of police violence documented in 2020 included prolonged excessive beatings (often on naked bodies), water immersion, the physical abuse of women and children, the use of metal rods to inflict injury.”

    In testimonies, people described how their hands were tied to the bars of cells and helmets put on their heads before beatings to avoid visible bruising.

    A lawsuit filed against the Greek state in April at the European court of human rights (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/apr/26/greece-accused-of-shocking-pushback-against-refugees-at-sea) accused Athens of abandoning dozens of migrants in life rafts at sea, after some had been beaten. The case claims that Greek patrol boats towed migrants back to Turkish waters and abandoned them at sea without food, water, lifejackets or any means to call for help.

    BVMN said: “Whether it be using the Covid-19 pandemic and the national lockdown to serve as a cover for pushbacks, fashioning open-air prisons, or preventing boats from entering Greek waters by firing warning shots toward boats, the evidence indicates the persistent refusal to uphold democratic values, human rights and international and European law.”

    According to UNHCR data, since the start of the pandemic, Libyan authorities – with Italian support since 2017, when Rome ceded responsibility (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jul/23/mother-and-child-drown-after-being-abandoned-off-libya-says-ngo) for overseeing Mediterranean rescue operations to Libya – intercepted and pushed back to Tripoli about 15,500 asylum seekers. The controversial strategy has caused the forced return of thousands to Libyan detention centres where, according to first hand reports, they face torture. Hundreds have drowned when neither Libya nor Italy intervened.

    “In 2020 this practice continued, with an increasingly important role being played by Frontex planes, sighting boats at sea and communicating their position to the Libyan coastguard,” said Matteo de Bellis, migration researcher at Amnesty International. “So, while Italy at some point even used the pandemic as an excuse to declare that its ports were not safe for the disembarkation of people rescued at sea, it had no problem with the Libyan coastguard returning people to Tripoli. Even when this was under shelling or when hundreds were forcibly disappeared immediately after disembarkation.”

    In April, Italy and Libya were accused of deliberately ignoring a mayday call (https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/apr/25/a-mayday-call-a-dash-across-the-ocean-and-130-souls-lost-at-sea) from a migrant boat in distress in Libyan waters, as waves reached six metres. A few hours later, an NGO rescue boat discovered dozens of bodies (https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/apr/25/a-mayday-call-a-dash-across-the-ocean-and-130-souls-lost-at-sea) floating in the waves. That day 130 migrants were lost at sea.

    In April, in a joint investigation with the Italian Rai News and the newspaper Domani, the Guardian saw documents from Italian prosecutors detailing conversations between two commanders of the Libyan coastguard and an Italian coastguard officer in Rome. The transcripts appeared to expose the non-responsive behaviour (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/apr/16/wiretaps-migrant-boats-italy-libya-coastguard-mediterranean) of the Libyan officers and their struggling to answer the distress calls which resulted in hundreds of deaths. At least five NGO boats remain blocked in Italian ports as authorities claim administrative reasons for holding them.

    “Push- and pull-back operations have become routine, as have forms of maritime abandonment where hundreds were left to drown,’’ said a spokesperson at Alarm Phone, a hotline service for migrants in distress at sea. ‘’We have documented so many shipwrecks that were never officially accounted for, and so we know that the real death toll is much higher. In many of the cases, European coastguards have refused to respond – they rather chose to let people drown or to intercept them back to the place they had risked their lives to escape from. Even if all European authorities try to reject responsibility, we know that the mass dying is a direct result of both their actions and inactions. These deaths are on Europe.’’

    Malta, which declared its ports closed early last year, citing the pandemic, has continued to push back hundreds of migrants using two strategies: enlisting private vessels to intercept asylum seekers and force them back to Libya or turning them away with directions to Italy (https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/may/20/we-give-you-30-minutes-malta-turns-migrant-boat-away-with-directions-to).

    “Between 2014 and 2017, Malta was able to count on Italy to take responsibility for coordinating rescues and allowing disembarkations,” said De Bellis. “But when Italy and the EU withdrew their ships from the central Mediterranean, to leave it in Libya’s hands, they left Malta more exposed. In response, from early 2020 the Maltese government used tactics to avoid assisting refugees and migrants in danger at sea, including arranging unlawful pushbacks to Libya by private fishing boats, diverting boats rather than rescuing them, illegally detaining hundreds of people on ill-equipped ferries off Malta’s waters, and signing a new agreement with Libya to prevent people from reaching Malta.”

    Last May, a series of voice messages obtained by the Guardian (https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/may/19/exclusive-12-die-as-malta-uses-private-ships-to-push-migrants-back-to-l) confirmed the Maltese government’s strategy to use private vessels, acting at the behest of its armed forces, to intercept crossings and return refugees to Libyan detention centres.

    In February 2020, the European court of human rights was accused of “completely ignoring the reality” after it ruled Spain did not violate the prohibition of collective expulsion (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/13/european-court-under-fire-backing-spain-express-deportations), as asylum applications could be made at the official border crossing point. Relying on this judgment, Spain’s constitutional court upheld “border rejections” provided certain safeguards apply.

    Last week, the bodies of 24 migrants from sub-Saharan Africa were found by Spain’s maritime rescue (https://apnews.com/article/atlantic-ocean-canary-islands-coronavirus-pandemic-africa-migration-5ab68371. They are believed to have died of dehydration while attempting to reach the Canary Islands. In 2020, according to the UNHCR, 788 migrants died trying to reach Spain (https://data2.unhcr.org/en/country/esp).

    Frontex said they couldn’t comment on the total figures without knowing the details of each case, but said various authorities took action to respond to the dinghy that sunk off the coast of Libya (https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/apr/25/a-mayday-call-a-dash-across-the-ocean-and-130-souls-lost-at-sea) in April, resulting in the deaths of 130 people.

    “The Italian rescue centre asked Frontex to fly over the area. It’s easy to forget, but the central Mediterranean is massive and it’s not easy or fast to get from one place to another, especially in poor weather. After reaching the area where the boat was suspected to be, they located it after some time and alerted all of the Maritime Rescue and Coordination Centres (MRCCs) in the area. They also issued a mayday call to all boats in the area (Ocean Viking was too far away to receive it).”

    He said the Italian MRCC, asked by the Libyan MRCC, dispatched three merchant vessels in the area to assist. Poor weather made this difficult. “In the meantime, the Frontex plane was running out of fuel and had to return to base. Another plane took off the next morning when the weather allowed, again with the same worries about the safety of the crew.

    “All authorities, certainly Frontex, did all that was humanly possible under the circumstances.”

    He added that, according to media reports, there was a Libyan coast guard vessel in the area, but it was engaged in another rescue operation.

    https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/may/05/revealed-2000-refugee-deaths-linked-to-eu-pushbacks

    #push-backs #refoulements #push-back #mourir_aux_frontières #morts_aux_frontières #décès #morts #asile #migrations #réfugiés #frontières #responsabilité #Croatie #viols #Grèce #Italie #Libye

    ping @isskein

  • Nearly 17 child migrants a day vanished in Europe since 2018

    Investigation finds one in six were solo and under 15, as experts say cross-border cooperation ‘nonexistent’.

    At least 18,000 unaccompanied child migrants have disappeared after arriving in European countries including Greece, Italy and Germany.

    An investigation by the Guardian and the cross-border journalism collective Lost in Europe found that 18,292 unaccompanied child migrants went missing in Europe between January 2018 and December 2020 – equivalent to nearly 17 children a day.

    In 2020 alone, 5,768 children disappeared in 13 European countries.

    Most of the children who have gone missing over the past three years came to Europe from Morocco, but Algeria, Eritrea, Guinea and Afghanistan were also among the top countries of origin. According to the data available, 90% were boys and about one in six were younger than 15.

    The investigation, which collated data on missing unaccompanied minors from all 27 EU countries, as well as Norway, Moldova, Switzerland and the UK, found the information provided was often inconsistent or incomplete, meaning the true numbers of missing children could be much higher.

    Spain, Belgium and Finland provided figures only up to the end of 2019. Denmark, France and the UK provided no data at all on unaccompanied missing children.

    The findings of the investigation raise serious questions about the extent European countries are able or willing to protect unaccompanied child migrants.

    Federica Toscano, head of advocacy and migration at Missing Children Europe, a non-profit organisation that connects grassroots agencies across Europe, said the data was “extremely important” for understanding the scale of the problem in Europe. “The high number of missing children is a symptom of a child-protection system that doesn’t work,” she said.

    She said unaccompanied children were among the migrants most vulnerable to violence, exploitation and trafficking. “Criminal organisations are increasingly targeting migrant children,” said Toscano, “especially unaccompanied ones and many of them become victims of labour and sexual exploitation, forced begging and trafficking.”

    In March 2019, the Guardian and Lost in Europe found that at least 60 Vietnamese children had disappeared from Dutch shelters. Dutch authorities suspected they had been trafficked into Britain to work on cannabis farms and in nail salons.

    Herman Bolhaar, the Dutch national rapporteur on human trafficking, said the investigation showed the urgent need for cooperation at the European level to address why thousands of unaccompanied migrant children have disappeared without a trace. “We cannot lose sight of these children,” he said. “They deserve our protection.”

    While almost all of the countries in the investigation have detailed procedures in place intended to deal with the disappearance of unaccompanied minors, they do not always work well in practice, according to a 2020 report from the European Migration Network, part of the European Union. Problems include failure to follow up when children are reported missing and insufficient cooperation between police and asylum or child protection authorities.

    “Very little is recorded in a file of a missing migrant child,” said Toscano, “and too often it is assumed that a migrant child is somewhere safe in another country, although cross-border collaboration on these cases is practically nonexistent.”

    There are multiple reasons why children go missing, she said, including “the lengthy and burdensome procedures to obtain international protection or to be reunited with their family”. Many were also held in inadequate facilities, often with no access to education, she added.

    A spokesperson for the European commission said there was “deep concern about children going missing”, adding that member states needed “to take action to prevent and respond to the disappearances of children in migration … by improving data collection and cross-border collaboration.”

    https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/apr/21/nearly-17-child-migrants-a-day-vanished-in-europe-since-2018

    #MNA #mineurs_non_accompagnés #asile #migrations #disparition #Europe #réfugiés #disparitions #enfants #enfance #réfugiés

    –-

    ajouté au fil de discussion autour des #statistiques de la « disparition » de MNA :

    https://seenthis.net/messages/714320
    #chiffres

    • Kako izbjeglička djeca nestaju u Evropi

      U posljednje tri godine nestalo je više od osamnaest hiljada izbjegličke djece koja su se domogla Evrope, pokazuje novo istraživanje. Državne institucije nemaju pojma gdje su djeca, ali su vjerovatno u velikoj opasnosti.

      Policijska kontrola na granici Njemačke i Poljske. Zaustavljen je automobil – vozač je Poljak, četvoro putnika su Vijetnamci bez isprava. Među njima je i djevojčica od petnaest godina. Kako je maloletna, a niko od saputnika joj nije rod, djevojčica završava u jednom državnom smještaju za djecu u njemačkoj pokrajini Brandenburg.

      Za taj slučaj su reporteri javnog servisa rbb doznali iz dokumentacije berlinskog Državnog tužilaštva. Jer djevojčica je nestala nedugo pošto je smještena u dom. Jedan od zaposlenih u domu prijavio je nestanak, i to je bilo to. Vijetnamska djevojčica je postala broj u statistici.

      Koliko ima djece sa sličnom sudbinom? To sada otkriva analiza novinarske grupe „Lost in Europe" („Izgubljeni u Evropi") u kojoj sarađuju reporteri londonskog Gardijana, holandskog servisa VPRO, njemačkog rbb i drugi. Prema istraživanju, od 2018. do 2020. je u Evropi nestalo 18.292 djece koja su stigla kao „maloljetne izbjeglice bez pratnje“ i za koju su bile nadležne institucije evropskih država.

      Ali, moguće je da je i više djece nestalo jer pojedine države vode manjkavu statistiku. Recimo, Francuska, Danska i Rumunija ne prikupljaju ove podatke. Bugarska ne pravi razliku između maloljetnika koji dođu sa starateljima i onih koji dođu sami.

      Evropska komisija zna za ove probleme. Ilva Johanson, komesarka za unutrašnje poslove, kaže da je Brisel već pozivao članice EU da „moraju da preduzmu više protiv nestanaka izbjegle djece, između ostalog boljim prikupljanjem podataka“.

      Prinuđena da trguje drogom

      Verena Kek iz međunarodne organizacije za dječija prava ECPAT vjeruje da je pravi broj djece kojima se u Evropi gubi trag zapravo mnogo viši. Kritikuje što se EU ne bavi ovim problemom zajednički, niti postoji centralni registar nestalih. „Za djecu i omladinu ovo može da ima fatalne posledice jer mogu dopasti u situaciju u kojoj su izrabljivani. A ako niko ne zna da su nestali, niko ih i ne traži.“

      Vijetnamska djevojčica sa početka priče nađena je poslije nekoliko mjeseci – slučajno. Policija je pronašla tokom racije u jednom stanu u Berlinu. Dijete je živjelo sa vijetnamskim parom koji je ilegalno prodavao drogu i cigarete. Ispostavilo se da je djevojčica bila primorana da radi u studiju za manikir za tri stotine eura mjesečno, da prodaje cigarete i isporučuje narkotike.

      U Njemačkoj je u posljednje tri godine prijavljeno 7.806 ovakvih nestanaka, ali se djeca uglavnom ponovo pronađu. Međutim, 724 njih nikada nije otkriveno. Najčešće nestaju djeca porijeklom iz Avganistana, zatim iz Maroka i Alžira.

      Pa i ovdje je statistika upitna. Savezni ured za kriminalistiku (BKA) koji je zadužen za registar nestalih priznaje da je to kod izbjegličke djece veoma teško jer nemaju papire. Neki bivaju registrovani više puta kao nestali, neki budu sasvim izostavljeni.

      To je skandal, grmi Holger Hofman iz organizacije Njemačka pomoć djeci. „Koliko znamo, nema pouzdanih podataka, čak ni približno. Takve rupe u znanju širom otvaraju vrata kriminalnim mrežama.“

      Evropski problem

      Europol je još 2016. upozoravao na kriminalne mreže koje iskorištavaju djecu koja sama izbjegnu u Evropu. U januaru ove godine je i BKA saopštio da se zna za vijetnamske bande koje trguju ljudima.

      Koliko je problem evropski, tragično je dokazao primjer iz oktobra 2019. godine. Tada je u kamionu-hladnjači nadomak Londona nađeno 39 mrtvih Vijetnamaca. Kamion je doputovao iz Belgije. Među žrtvama su bila dva dječaka koji su desetak dana ranije pobjegli iz jednog doma u Holandiji.

      Tamo ih je prethodno dovela holandska policija koja ih je pronašla u jednom drugom kamionu – koji je krenuo iz Kelna.

      https://www.dw.com/bs/kako-izbjegli%C4%8Dka-djeca-nestaju-u-evropi/a-57243605