Two refugee boats that had departed from the Greek coast towards Italy were saved on monday by the Italian Coast Guard. The approx. 80 refugees were mainly from Afghanistan. They had been one week on the sea. Most of them were dehydrated, without food and water when they were found.
information with, about and for refugees in Greece
Tag Archive for 'transit'
Page 4 of 5
The boat carrying around 60-70 refugees mainly from Afghanistan had left Kerkyra in the early morning hours. The machine broke down and water started entering the boat when the refugees could contact the Greek coast guard in order to get saved.
The strong winds carried the boat near to Lefkada. In the afternoon hours the coast guard could bring the boat finally to the port of Preveza.
Press Release by the Solidarity Group in Patras concerning the increased violence against migrants and refugees in the area around the new port in Patras, 13th of October 2011:
Press Release (in English)
Press Release (in Greek)
Statement by the Afghan Association “Bahar”:
Since March 2011 the Afghan refugees in Patra have created the association „bahar“ (English: „spring“) with the aim to help each other to integrate into the Greek society in an atmosphere of friendship and harmony with the locals.
Unfortunately, within the last five months we have seen an increase in incidents of violence by the authorities against us Afghan refugees. Everyday Afghans report to us of violent attacks with severe injuries. The victims have attestations of the hospitals to prove these. This brutal strategy of the authorities constitutes a harsh human rights violation and in any case is no solution for the migration issue in Patras whatsoever.
The association of Afghans in Patra “Bahar” has started to raise this issue of violence in public. We will stand at the side of all victims and we will take also legal measures to report these human rights violations.
Athens, 28th of September 2011
Terror and Fear in the Open Sea
In the open sea close to Zakynthos a group of 65 Afghan and Iraqi-Kurdish refugees experienced days of terror and fear when they were trying to reach the Italian shore. They were in serious danger of death by drowning and starvation when their boat went into distress. Among them were many children and families. One of them lost his life, while trying to save himself by swimming. Two others took their last breaths in the hospital, following their rescue after 11 days on the open sea.
refugees in an overcrowded boat trying to find a safe haven
The tragic story of refugees and migrants who are forced to leave behind their home due to war, poverty and persecution takes no end. Among the refugees in the boat many had already lost relatives on the sea and land borders on their way from Afghanistan and Iraq through other countries and until here. Their tragic stories continue in Greece, a country, which in the name of crisis and a repressive migration policy of Fortress Europe denies providing refugees with their basic rights, with a functioning reception infrastructure and integrating them into social and economical life. This gives the extreme-right a leeway to target them both ideologically and in practice on the streets and to use them as scapegoats of a policy of poverty and misery. It leads the refugees and migrants to a further quest for a safe life in another country – whatever it may cost.
This incident is not rare but it is a tough reality with many victims. Many boats in distress, many deaths at the borders – and the European governments are well aware of it.
Following this tragedy some of the survivors returned to Athens, among them a single father with his two small kids (4-6 years old) in his arms, searching for some corner on the squares and streets of Athens. In their hands the deportation order, which the police authorities gave them without asking where they will go or what they will eat. Nobody asked them if they need protection or if they want to claim asylum.
Respectfully,
Against the repressive measures of the authorities who in the most violent way show their “law and order” approach towards the issue of migration in Patras:
Press Release by the solidarity group in Patras (in English)
The police reacted to the denouncing press release by stating that if there were incidents of police violence against migrants then the solidarity group should file charges against them at the public prosecutor. Meanwhile the authorities are well aware of how difficult this is. However, only documented migrants can file charges while most of the refugees and migrants in Patras are in transit and without legal residence permits. The few among them with valid papers are often too afraid of taking legal measures against the authorities. Another difficulty arises from the long duration of judicial proceedings. Most of the migrant victims and witnesses leave Greece before the date of the court case is reached.
On Friday, September 23, a small boat that was trying to get to Italy carrying 65 Kurds and Afghans sans-papiers, broke 90 miles southwest of the island of Zakynthos. When port police reached the vessel only 32 immigrants were aboard. A helicopter participating in the rescue operation managed to save 30 immigrants that have fallen in the sea. Late in the afternoon, the same helicopter discovered the bodies of 3 sans-papiers who drowned at sea.
Around the 8th of September unknown people set fire on a barack where asylum seekers were temporarily living in the transit-port of Patras.
As A., an Eritrean refugee reported:
I have been homeless in Athens. I have been homeless in Patras. I have been homeless in Igoumenitsa. I applied for asylum. Now I am again homeless in Patras. I live on the beach and in ruins. Police is hunting us every day.
A few days ago somebody lit fire on the ruin we were living in. I think it was the racists. Everything burned. All our belongings. My AFM (tax number), my work permit, my clothes. Everything. I am left now only with my Pink Card (asylum seekers temporary residence permit) but what is it worth? What can it do for me? I am still homeless and unprotected.
Transit in Patras
Following a number of police raids in the last months, currently, there are very few sans-papiers and asylum seekers left in Patras. The ones who have remained suffer, as K. from Somalia tells us:
“I only stay here because I don’t have any other place to go! There is no chance to leave from here for Italy. Very very few manage. The new port is very dangerous. Police is hunting and beating us, they even have dogs. My Pink Card got tear up by my former employer who didn’t want to pay me for the work I did. Now it is almost one month that I am only with a copy of my Pink Card. They say, I cannot get a new one if I don’t have an address in Patras, but where should I get it from? Two days ago a police control arrested me. I asked them to go and catch the copy of my Pink Card, but they didn’t let me go. I was in prison for two days. I am understanding more and more about this country. Nothing good to tell!”
Following the huge eviction of the jungles of Igoumenitsa at the 9th of June, Patras became the second war region in the governments cruel fight against the sans-papiers who are trying to leave the country. The government seems to set a clear sign that the ports of exit towards Italy are now a no-go for refugees and migrants. Will the Apartheid ruling Igoumenitsa come to Patras now? It seems so.
We have no place to stay anymore. We have to sleep at the seaside under the sky. The police is coming everyday to hunt us in order that we leave Patras. We have been hunted in Komunisia before. We have been hunted at the border,in Athens, at work… One by one we get crazy now. Some of us try to leave Greece back to Turkey. But they don´t let us go there too. They hunt us again and again. Now one of my friends got lost in Evros while he was trying to cross the river in the direction of Turkey. We believe he died. In one or two days we will be all crazy!
The municipality of Patras destroyed in a recent police raid the train shelter of migrants in St. Dyonisios, opposite to the port of Patras. They left behind the migrants, who will have to sleep under the stars of the sky without any protection in the following nights. The police invaded the area of the train company due to the ‘inhuman living conditions’ of the migrants and for reasons of ‘public health’. The hypocracy of the state continues in the name of ‘law and order’.
After a preparative meeting the municipality of Igoumenitsa, the local initiative “struggle” (consisting of inhabitants that live in the areas Ladohori and Grekohori where many of the homeless sans-papiers live too amonge the olive trees of the Greeks and on the mountain) and some other groups and organisations of the city announced that they will close the international ferry-port at the 3rd of May 2011 to protest against the many sans-papiers who daily try to leave Greece through the second largest port of exit. 
The desperate refugees live under degrading conditions in the mountains along the rims of the city. Recently rising conflicts among them and the reigning chaos along and inside the port have been used to spark the fire on migration issues in the city: specifically this lead to re-intensified protest mobilisations by the local population, fascist propaganda and growing measures of repression by the authorities.
http://www.thebest.gr/news/index/viewStory/64858
http://www.athensnews.gr/portal/9/40912