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EU Citizen to Spend 6 Years in a Turkish
Prison Because of the EU

European Court of Human Rights, February 2022

front-LEX filed a case against Greece at the European Court of Human Rights challenging the racist push-back of an EU/French citizen from the EU.  

The case was filed on behalf of a French student who left the EU to study at a Turkish university. After she was politically persecuted and condemned to 6 years in prison by the Turkish regime, she fled to Greece in order to enter EU territory, with the aim of returning to her family and home in France. 

 

After crossing the Evros river in October 2021, the victim presented her French Passport and ID, permitting her to enter the Schengen zone, informed the Greek forces of the grave risk she was exposed to in Turkey, and begged them to let her in. Her family in France contacted the Greek and French consular authorities multiple times, alerted them of the situation and requested urgent diplomatic protection, but to no avail:

 

Based on a racial profiling, Greek forces abducted, detained, abused, forcibly transferred the young woman to an unsafe dinghy and collectively expelled her on a life-threatening voyage to a military zone in Turkey where soldiers captured her. She is now serving 6 years in a Turkish prison in cruel, degrading, and inhuman conditions for a political crime she has not committed.

 

The Greek Government and Frontex are perpetrating countless human rights abuses at the external borders of the EU. Whether EU citizens or foreign nationals, tens of thousands of toddlers, women and men have been victims of the appalling policy of pushbacks across the Evros river. 

 

front-LEX calls on the EU to immediately institute infringement proceedings against Greece and terminate Frontex’s operation in the country in accordance with EU, European and international law. front-LEX calls on the French government to demand Greece to immediately cease its pushback policy, and to demand Turkey to release and let a French national return to her home in France.

UPDATE

15 November 2023 - front-LEX responds to the Greek Government's Statement of Defence! 

*** In its Response to the Court, the Greek Government Continues to Racialize the Victim, Classifying her as an ‘Illegal Migrant’. Now front-LEX Requests the Court to Condemn Greece and Grant +2.5M Euros in Damages to the Victim. ***

front-LEX illustrates how Greece continues to mischaracterize the young French woman and her husband, together subjected to a racialized ‘pushback’ by Greek authorities in 2021, as ‘irregular migrants’ and ‘third-country nationals’. The Applicants are again victimized based on their non-White, Muslim appearance and their legal rights to enter and stay in the EU are being entirely disregarded - first at the border and now in the courtroom. As a result of Greece’s racialized mischaracterization, front-LEX argues that the government’s position is legally inapplicable and factually irrelevant to these cases.

front-LEX demands a clear condemnation from the ECtHR of the Greek government’s racially-based border policy to render justice and remedy for the racist ‘pushback’ and ensuing unlawful & prolonged imprisonment the Applicants continue to be subjected to.

Documents
Press Release I
ECtHR Case Submission (18/02/2022)
Press Release II 
Response to Greek Government (15/11/2023)
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