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For months there have been numerous complaints against the Greek Coast Guard for alleged hot returns from Greece to Turkey. EL MUNDO documented one of them. Now, it will be the European agency in charge of security at land and maritime borders, the so-called Frontex, who will have to answer to the judge for a similar action. A Syrian family has filed a

lawsuit for their deportation from European soil,

now five years ago, allegedly without guarantees.

The couple, with four children and originally from the Kurdish city of Kobane, denounce that he was deported using all kinds of tricks. Although they had formally applied for asylum in Greece, after arriving on the island of Leros in an irregular manner,

Hellenic and Brussels officials transferred them to Kos under the pretext of later transferring them to Athens.

By contrast, on October 20, 2016, a plane flew them to the southern Turkish city of Adana.

At that time, the refugee pact had barely started, an agreement forged by Brussels and Turkey that committed Ankara to readmit any irregular immigrant who had entered the EU from its territory, as long as their asylum application was on the ground. Greek would have been negative. In return,

the Turks would receive European funding for the management of the migration crisis

and a series of administrative perks, such as the liberalization of Schengen visas for Turkish citizens.

"I never knew that he [was] going to be deported to Turkey," the father admitted then, according to the newspaper 'The Guardian', from a Turkish detention center. "The [Greek] policemen told us' leave dinner, take your things, we will take you to a police station at night and tomorrow you will be in Athens," he said. During the return trip,

the children, aged between seven and eleven, were forced to sit in a separate place from the flight,

along with Frontex guards.

This is what Prakken d'Oliveira, the Netherlands law firm that has brought Frontex before the General Court of the Court of Justice of the European Union, for a type of practice similar to hot returns, denounces it in its brief.

Although it is not the only lawsuit under way against the border body, which has 660 agents dedicated to patrolling the waters of the Aegean to contain immigration, Lisa-Marie Komp, one of the lawyers, highlights an important particularity in her case.

Illegal returns

"This time, it concerns a joint and official operation.

There is documented cooperation between Frontex and Greece

[to deport the Syrian family back to Turkish soil]," the lawyer underlines, in statements to this medium. However, Komp clarifies, "there are several reports that document how Frontex also participates in hot returns at sea, even if they are not carried out in an official joint operation".

Frontex began its activity on the eastern European borders in October 2016, when the deportation of this family is dated. Since then,

complaints of complicity,

if not cooperation with the illegal returns allegedly carried out by Greece, have been constant.

He is blamed for having played a role in the hot return of nearly 40,000 asylum seekers

, resulting in

2,000 deaths,

allegedly in violation of European and international law.

Aegean Boat Report has documented since March 2020 the cases of 6,659 "victims of inhuman and cruel treatment by the Greek Government", allegedly returned hot. For its part, Lisa-Marie Komp's team wants the Community Justice to also rule on the role of Frontex: "This case will give the General Court the opportunity to determine that

Frontex must comply with its duty to guarantee respect for rights fundamental

in all its obligations ".

After three years and eight months of silence, Frontex responded to the requirements of the Dutch law firm. The agency admitted the transfer, blaming the decision to "the national authorities" and underlining that their role was to provide "means of transportation, trained escorts, translators and medical personnel." In a report, published in a Greek media, he acknowledged that

asylum had been demanded 11 days

before deportation,

but was registered in his system a day after this.

'The Guardian' details that Yannis Mouzalas, minister in charge of immigration policy in Greece then governed by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, has acknowledged that he ordered an investigation after it became clear that "violations" had been committed. But he has acknowledged that he does not know the result since he left office before its conclusion. "What I know is that it

is the responsibility of the competent Greek authorities [to deport them], not Frontex,

which transported them," he added.

For Komp, the stakes are high in this case, which puts the spotlight, once again, on a practice that Turkey has begun to apply to Afghans trying to reach Europe from Iran.

As for Frontex, the lawyer highlights, "if they act without anybody being held accountable to such operations, with the member states looking elsewhere in the face of human rights violations, the rule of law, rights and freedoms are undermined. In other words, the very foundations of the European Union. "

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