(Athens) The Greek government assured that the alleged death of dozens of migrants during pushback operations carried out by the Greek coast guard was “in no way proven” in the investigation carried out by the British channel BBC and revealed Monday.
“We follow each publication, each investigation, but I repeat: what is reported is in no way proven,” insisted the spokesperson for the government of Kyriakos Mitsotakis during a press conference.
The Greek coast guard “saves dozens of human lives every day,” added Pavlos Marinakis as many people seeking asylum in the European Union try to reach Greece from Turkey in dangerous crossings.
In Brussels, European Commission spokesperson Eric Mamer said he was aware of “these terrible allegations.”
“The Greek authorities, like all EU Member States, must fully respect their obligations on asylum and international law,” he added.
The BBC, in an investigation published on its website on Monday, recorded 43 migrants who died after being turned back into the Aegean Sea by Greek coast guards between May 2020 and May 2023.
Among the victims, nine were deliberately thrown into the sea, according to the BBC.
The British channel recorded fifteen incidents of violent pushbacks of migrants contrary to international law during this period.
Based on reports from local media, NGOs and the Turkish coast guard, BBC journalists were also able to speak with eyewitnesses.
A Cameroonian national thus recounted that after disembarking on the island of Samos in September 2021, he was arrested with two other migrants by masked men who forced them, by punching them, to board a boat which then abandoned them in the open sea.
The bodies of his two companions, an Ivorian and a Cameroonian, were found on the Turkish coast and the Cameroonian refugee’s lawyers have sued the Greek authorities for double homicide.
Last year, after one of the worst migrant shipwrecks in the Mediterranean that killed more than 600 people, survivors filed a lawsuit against the Greek coastguard for delaying their rescue.
