Turkey Is Forcibly Transporting Migrants to the Greek Border, Pushing Them Across

Editor’s note: Has graduated from simply luring the migrants to the Greek border, and helping them reach (and penetrate) it — to at least in some cases, forcibly transporting them there and pushing them across. Apparently the Turkish border police has in some cases fired tear gas at the migrants to pressure them to attempt to breach the Greek border.

Around 300 migrants from Ankara’s Akyurt Repatriation Center were transported to the border against their will on Feb. 29, said Sadık Onur Gelbal, the chair of the Ankara Bar Association’s Migrant Rights Center on March 4.

While members of the rights center weren’t allowed into the repatriation center for inspection, lawyers who entered it to meet with their clients witnessed the refugees being forced to travel.

“We were informed by colleagues who witnessed it first hand that on the night of February 29, migrants were forced onto buses and involuntarily transported to the border,” Gelbal said.

The attorney told Gelbal their client had been forced to depart even though they had an ongoing lawsuit in Ankara. He added that they weren’t able to prevent the migration management officials from transporting them.

“The migration management officials emptied out the repatriation center with six buses,” Gelbal said. “A migrant who is still in there said that there are only seven people remaining there who are resisting being transported.”

#BREAKING #Turkey deploys 1000 special police units to Greek border to prevent illegal pushbacks, Interior Minister Soylu says pic.twitter.com/zKjm7jY3tx

— EHA News (@eha_news) March 5, 2020

Bar member Ebru Beşe said that one of their coworkers was kept from meeting with their client and was surprised by what they saw at the center.

“When they went to make an official complaint about the meeting they missed, they saw that the whole center was empty,” Beşe noted.

Another attorney of the bar who wished to remain anonymous told Gelbal that they received a call from a client in the middle of the night on Feb. 29, telling them “they’re taking me away by force.”

“When we went there that night, no officials came to talk to us,” said the attorney, “According to the migrants, some six or seven buses carrying 250 to 300 people left that night.”

Source: Duvar

#Evros now: Videos obtained by ⁦⁦@derspiegel⁩ show migrants throwing tear gas used (and acc to GR officials and simple logic provided) by Turkish Gendarmerie at Greek police preventing them from crossing the fence, near Kastanies. Human beings shamelessly weaponized pic.twitter.com/daWRZz9P1M

— Giorgos Christides (@g_christides) February 29, 2020

As Turkey has announced that they will send 1000 special forces to the Greek borders to make sure the refugees will not be sent back by Greek police. And Greek said they’ll not let any refugee stay there…
This is first steps to make camps on the borders
Disaster pic.twitter.com/GMfrsgAaAH

— Asaad Hanna (@AsaadHannaa) March 5, 2020

The mass attack on Friday night by border guards in Kastanias Evros from people trying to illegally cross into Greece from the Turkish side captures a video released.

The video shows immigrants flying incandescent woods, stones and even tear gas of Turkish origin to the police. pic.twitter.com/W7nGzReCFK

— Greekcitytimes (@greekcitytimes) February 29, 2020

https://twitter.com/arisroussinos/status/1235113923285635072