Pressemitteilung zum Urteil des Europäischen Gerichtshofs für Menschenrechte zur Abschiebung von Flüchtlingen nach Griechenland durch italienische Behörden, 21.10.2014 (engl. Originalfassung)
Indiscriminate collective expulsion by the Italian authorities of Afghan migrants, who were then deprived of access to the asylum procedure in Greece
The European Court of Human Rights delivered today its Chamber judgment in the case of Sharifi and Others v. Italy and Greece (application no. 16643/09).
The case concerned 32 Afghan nationals, two Sudanese nationals and one Eritrean national, who alleged, in particular that they had entered Italy illegally from Greece and been returned to that country immediately, with the fear of subsequent deportation to their respective countries of origin, where they faced the risk of death, torture or inhuman or degrading treatment.
The Court held, by a majority, concerning four of the applicants, Reza Karimi, Yasir Zaidi, Mozamil Azimi and Najeeb Heideri (also known as Nagib Haidari), who had maintained regular contact with their lawyer in the proceedings before this Court, that there had been:
a violation by Greece of Article 13 (right to an effective remedy) combined with Article 3 (prohibition of inhuman or regarding treatment) of the European Convention on Human Rights on account of the lack of access to the asylum procedure for the above-named applicants and the risk of deportation to Afghanistan, where they were likely to be subjected to ill-treatment;
a violation by Italy of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 (prohibition of collective expulsion of aliens);
a violation by Italy of Article 3, as the Italian authorities, by returning these applicants to Greece, had exposed them to the risks arising from the shortcomings in that country’s asylum procedure; and,
a violation by Italy of Article 13 combined with Article 3 of the Convention and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 on account of the lack of access to the asylum procedure or to any other remedy in the port of Ancona.
The Court held, in particular, that it shared the concerns of several observers with regard to the automatic return, implemented by the Italian border authorities in the ports of the Adriatic Sea, of persons who, in the majority of cases, were handed over to ferry captains with a view to being removed to Greece, thus depriving them of any procedural and substantive rights.
In addition, it reiterated that the Dublin system – which serves to determine which European Union Member State is responsible for examining an asylum application lodged in one of the Member States by a third-country national – must be applied in a manner compatible with the Convention: no form of collective and indiscriminate returns could be justified by reference to that system, and it was for the State carrying out the return to ensure that the destination country offered sufficient guarantees in the application of its asylum policy to prevent the person concerned being removed to his country of origin without an assessment of the risks faced.
Principal facts
The applicants are 32 Afghan nationals, two Sudanese nationals and one Eritrean national, who claimed to have arrived illegally in Italy from Greece. They stated that, on various dates in 2007 and 2008, they entered Greek territory from countries experiencing armed conflicts which affected civilians (specifically Afghanistan, Sudan and Eritrea). After illegally boarding vessels for Italy in Patras (Greece), they arrived between January 2008 and February 20092 in the ports of Bari, Ancona and Venice, where the border police intercepted them and immediately deported them back to Greece.
The Italian Government claimed that, of the applicants, only Reza Karimi had reached Italian territory. Hidden with seventeen other illegal migrants in a lorry transporting vegetables, he had been discovered by the police in the port of Ancona on 14 January 2009 and sent back to Greece on the same day. He had arrived in Patras (Greece) the next day. According to the Greek Government, only ten of the applicants had entered Greek territory. Deportation orders had been issued against those ten persons, some of whom were placed in administrative detention – and, for the most part, subsequently released – and they were given 30 days to leave Greece. According to information submitted by the Greek Ministry of the Interior, only one person had applied for asylum (which was refused) and another had had the execution of his deportation order suspended following the indication of interim measures by the European Court of Human Rights (Rule 39 of the Rules of Court), asking the Greek Government to stay the deportation of six of the applicants. One of those six applicants was nonetheless returned to Turkey, and two others were placed in detention facilities in Albania pending deportation. On both of those occasions, the Court reminded the Greek Government of the obligations arising from measures indicated under Rule 39. The applicants’ lawyer, Ms Ballerini, informed the Court between July and December 2009 of the situation of some of the applicants. In particular, she stated that the Greek police had evacuated a camp in Patras, destroying the shelters used by asylum seekers and arresting certain of the applicants; however, she claimed that she was not in a position to provide their names, on account of the confusing situation which prevailed. Some of the applicants were living on the streets – in Athens or Patras –, while others were in different countries (Sweden, Switzerland, Norway...).
On 15 June 2010 Ms Ballerini sent the Court a document stating that in May 2010 one of the applicants, Najeeb Heideri, had run away from Patras and succeeded in entering Italy, where, at the Parma police headquarters, he had presented a claim for international protection. In October 2010 the lawyer was also in contact with Mozamil Azimi and Reza Karimi, who were living in a reception centre in Norway. She subsequently informed the Court that Reza Karimi had been returned to Afghanistan and provided the Court with information about his situation. On several occasions in the course of 2011 and 2012 Ms Ballerini also submitted information on the situation of several applicants, including Yasir Zaidi, who had been in Germany and then in Sweden, and had asked her about the progress of his application to the European Court of Human Rights. In April 2013 the lawyer also informed the Court that Najeeb Heideri had been granted refugee status in Italy. He claimed to have attempted to enter Italy from Greece on two occasions and to have been subjected to an informal return in the port of Ancona, with no prior identification. The Italian Government emphasised that his name had never been entered in the “Eurodac3 ” database as being an asylum seeker in Greece.
Die vollständige Pressemitteilung zum Urteil finden Sie hier (pdf).