Human Rights | Secret report seen by Der Spiegel: Greece pushes migrants back to sea in life-threatening conditions, and EU agency covers its tracks

European the anti-fraud agency Olaf has investigated the activities of the European border and maritime guard Frontex in Greece. According to the report published in February, the agency under the EU has helped the Greek coast guard to cover up the bad and illegal treatment of migrants and refugees.

German Der Spiegel magazine, the French Le Monde and Lighthouse Reports have obtained the secret report. According to the media, the information in the report is likely to destroy the careers of more Frontex employees. The media have been exposing scandals related to Frontex for a couple of years now, but the management of Frontex has kept its face against the accusations. Olaf’s report eventually led to the director of Frontex by Fabrice Legger get rid of at the end of April.

Read more: According to the head of Frontex, the responsibility for turning the migrant boats lies with Greece – MEPs demand the suspension of the operation and an independent investigation

Olaf’s the report confirms information previously reported by the media about Frontex’s reluctance to defend human rights in the Aegean Sea and its involvement in covering up the illegalities of the Greek Coast Guard.

The content of the report just doesn’t seem very interesting to the EU Commission, writes Der Spiegel. According to the newspaper, the fact that the vice-president of the commission is a Greek conservative politician affects the matter Margaritis Schinas.

At the end of May, Schinas said of a Dutch newspaper in an interview that there is no concrete evidence of illegal actions by the Greek Coast Guard. According to Schinas, the accusations are made up by human rights organizations, the media and Turkey’s authoritarian regime.

At the same time, Olaf’s report on the actions of the Greek Coast Guard and Frontex’s involvement in them had already been available to the Commission for months.

Read more: The EU started an investigation into the abuses of its border guard agency

Olaf’s according to the report, Frontex director Leggeri lied to the European Parliament and covered up that the guard was using European taxpayers’ money to support illegal activities in Greece.

Greece has repeatedly and for years carried out so-called pushback operations, i.e. pushing migrants arriving in rubber boats back into the sea, so that they could not land in Greece.

In some cases, the boat has already made it to shore, only to be towed back out to sea by the Coast Guard.

On July 7, the European Court of Human Rights ruled against Greece for human rights violations in the pushback operation. In 2014, Greece towed a boat carrying migrants back to Turkey in rough seas. The boat capsized during the operation, and 11 passengers died. Some of the dead were children.

Frontex has witnessed but not intervened in Greek pushback operations, the report says.

For example, in August 2020, the Greek coast guard towed a rubber boat with 30 migrants on board. The coast guard should have escorted the boat safely to the port, where the migrants would have had the right to register as asylum seekers.

Instead, the Coast Guard towed the boat across the Aegean Sea back to Turkey.

Frontex officials monitored the events in the Aegean Sea and reported them to the Frontex headquarters in Poland. Frontex was also aware that the Greek Coast Guard had acted in a similar way before.

The Frontex authorities still did not intervene in the case.

According to OLAF investigators, Frontex management prevented a proper investigation of the case and withdrew its surveillance aircraft from the area so that authorities would not witness further human rights violations.

The report according to Leggeri withheld essential videos and documents from Frontex’s own internal fundamental rights monitor, Inmaculada by Arnáez. Arnáez’s task was to monitor Frontex’s operations from a human rights perspective.

Leggeri tried to get rid of Arnáez, among other things, by putting this job in an open search while Arnáez was on sick leave in 2019.

The European Commission found out about Legger’s actions and considered them illegal. The commission ordered Legger to withdraw the job search.

In the same year, the parliament had authorized the hiring of 40 human rights observers who were to come under Arnáez to monitor Europe’s external borders. Even at the beginning of last year, Leggeri had not succeeded in hiring observers.

EU Commissioner for Home Affairs Ylva Johansson accused Legger at the time of leading Parliament astray and unwillingness to act according to the regulations.

New the report supports all previously revealed facts about Frontex’s activities, but also reveals motives for the actions through the exchange of messages between Legger and his subordinates, writes Der Spiegel.

“When reading the messages, you can’t come to any conclusion other than that for years the EU tolerated a man leaning in the direction of right-wing populists at the head of its border guard,” writes Der Spiegel.

According to Der Spiegel, Leggeri, who took over the leadership of Frontex in 2015, “radicalized” over the years. The paper relies on its interpretation To the stories of Legger’s former colleagues.

According to the interviewees, Leggeri repeatedly ignored concerns about the realization of human rights at Europe’s external borders.

In particular, Legger’s inner circle was hostile towards the fundamental rights supervisor Arnáez.

Arnáez was compared, among other things, to a dictator in the messages of the inner circle To Pol Pot, and the messages alleged that the human rights watchdog was terrorizing the guard in the style of the Khmer Rouge. In one meeting, a Frontex employee warned the others that the workers monitoring fundamental rights “are not genuine Frontex colleagues”.

Frontex interim director Aija Kalnaja hopes that Leggeri and his actions can be left behind as soon as possible, says Der Spiegel.

Meanwhile, a steady stream of new evidence is emerging that the Greek Coast Guard is continuing to turn away migrants in the Aegean.

According to Der Spiegel, Kalnaja has not read Olaf’s report, although it also reveals things about the guard purchase that are not related to the actions of the previous director. According to Olaf’s report, the Greek coast guards have, among other things, pressured Frontex employees not to report abuses.

Furthermore, Frontex has other concerns to deal with than Legger’s legacy. For example, Frontex employees have reported inadequate working conditions at the borders.

According to Der Spiegel, Olaf’s report also raises questions about the EU’s funding for Greece. Every year, the Commission transfers millions of euros to Greece to deal with the migrant situation. Abandoning migrants to the open sea is not an appropriate use of money.