MEDITERRANEAN: People trapped in buffer zone finally allowed to enter Cyprus ― NGO report reveals more evidence of pushbacks in Greece ― Italy removing staff from migration centres in Albania ― Decision about Malta’s jurisdiction in El Hiblu 3 case due in January 2025 | European Council on Refugees and Exiles (ECRE)

All of the people who have spent the past six months trapped in the buffer zone that divides the north and south of the island of Cyprus have finally been allowed to enter the Republic of Cyprus.
A new NGO report has revealed yet more evidence of pushbacks and abuse against people on the move in Greece.
Italy has removed most of the staff from its migration centres in Albania.
A court in Malta has announced that its decision about the country’s jurisdiction to prosecute the El Hiblu 3 will be delivered in January 2025.

All of the people who have spent the past six months trapped in the buffer zone that divides the north and south of the island of Cyprus have finally been allowed to enter the Republic of Cyprus. According to a statement that was issued by Cypriot Deputy Minister of Migration Dr Nicholas Ioannides on 16 November, “the temporary camps that had been set up in [the Buffer Zone] have been evacuated”. “All the people who were there have now been transferred to third countries or exceptionally to the reception centre in Kofinou, so that the procedures for their transfer to third countries or their deportation can be carried out,” he added. Despite Ioannides’ declaration that the Cypriot government “will not accept these people in the Republic’s asylum system”, according to ECRE member organisation the Cyprus Refugee Council, it appears that all of them have actually been given access to asylum procedures.

The Cypriot government’s decision to allow the people to leave the buffer zone and enter Cypriot territory came after approximately six months during which it repeatedly rejected appeals to do so. According to the NGO Movement for Equality, Support and Anti-racism (KISA), the policy reversal was due to the intervention of the European Court on Human Rights (ECtHR) following an application that it had submitted jointly with the Italian NGO the Rule 39 Initiative. “Last Friday, the court asked the parties for clarification on several important points, directing the Cypriot government to provide information, including whether the applicants had access to asylum procedures in Cyprus, and whether the applicants are in danger of indirect refoulement in the buffer zone,” KISA said, adding: “This outstanding interlocutory result was the decisive factor that led to the government’s decision to finally allow all the refugees it had trapped in the buffer zone to enter the government-controlled areas”. However, the issue is not yet fully resolved for KISA. “Despite this positive development, we intend to maintain their applications unless the government decides to compensate them for the violations of their rights,” it concluded. Although the buffer zone has been the main entry point for people seeking asylum in Cyprus for many years, the Cypriot government’s reaction to the latest incident suggests that it has not necessarily accepted this reality. “Our position remains that the Green Line will not become a migrant corridor,” said Ioannides.

A new NGO report has revealed yet more evidence of pushbacks and abuse against people on the move in Greece. According to the new report by ECRE member organisation the Greek Council for Refugees (GCR), Greek authorities have been undertaking illegal practices with impunity. It provides detailed descriptions of 12 pushback cases that occurred in the Evros border region in 2023 and highlights Greece’s “complete indifference” to the ECtHR despite the latter having issued more than 80 interim measures relating to the protection of newly arrived people there. The report also includes a number of recommendations for both Greek and EU authorities, including investigating “serious allegations of ill-treatment related to the Hellenic Police and the Hellenic Coast Guard at external borders” and launching infringement proceedings against the Greek state for “well-documented, long-term and systematic breaches of international and EU law in its treatment of asylum seekers”. In a press release issued to mark the launch of the report on 26 November, Alkistis Agrafioti Chatzigianni from GCR said: “We strongly believe that independent, prompt and effective investigations will increase accountability for rights violations at the EU’s external borders and can assist in ending this cycle of violence”.

Italy has removed most of the staff from its migration centres in Albania. Just over one month after the centres in Shëngjin and Gjadër opened on 11 October following months of delays, “dozens” of police officers and social workers who had been deployed to work in the two centres have reportedly been moved back to Italy. Although the centres are theoretically capable of receiving up to 3,000 asylum-seeking men per month, ongoing legal issues have meant that only 24 have actually been transferred to Albania, none of whom has stayed for more than 48 hours before being transferred to Italy. According to the German Press Agency (DPA), just seven of the staff employed by Medihspes, the company responsible for managing operations in the centres, will remain along with “some local-hire Albanian employees and an undisclosed number of Italian police officers”. Commenting on the latest development regarding the centres, which he described as an “epochal failure”, the leader of the opposition More Europe (+Eu) party, Riccardo Magi MP, declared on 23 November: “Mission accomplished! The government has succeeded in the effort to repatriate. Migrants? No, Italian operators sent to Albania, who will be returning home by the weekend”. Former prime minister and leader of the Italy Alive (IV) party, Matteo Renzi, X posted: “What remains in Albania is a colossal structure built by local entrepreneurs with Italian taxpayers’ money – destined to decay”. Elisabetta Piccolotti MP from the opposition Green and Left Alliance (AVS) said: “The government has failed knowing it would fail,” adding: “They have spent a mountain of money and played with people’s rights. This will remain in history as a shameful page for our country”. The Italian Ministry of the Interior has said that the centres will remain “operational and under surveillance” and that staffing levels had been reduced “in line with current needs”.

A court in Malta has announced that its decision about the country’s jurisdiction to prosecute the El Hiblu 3 will be delivered in January 2025. The Maltese Court of Criminal Appeal made its announcement on 6 November following an appeal hearing on the Valletta Criminal Court’s decision to reject an attempt by lawyers representing Abdul Kader, Amara Kromah and Abdalla Bari – the three young men who stand accused of hijacking an oil tanker when they were teenagers in March 2019 – to have the case against them dropped on the grounds that the incident had taken place off the coast of Tripoli and therefore outside Malta’s jurisdiction. Reacting to the announcement, the Free the El Hiblu 3 campaign said: “Instead of prosecuting them, the three young men should be celebrated for their actions in preventing the forceful and illegal return of 100 lives to unsafe and war-torn Libya. Now, in the sixth year of this emotional, psychological draining procedure, Malta has yet another chance during the appeal process to dismiss the charges before the affected get retraumatised by being sent back to prison”. “The serious allegations made by Malta’s Office of the Attorney General must now be dismissed entirely (…) It is not too late to rectify this grave injustice,” it added.

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