After five years of operation in the Aegean, we have decided with a heavy heart to withdraw from Lesvos, end our human rights monitoring as Mare Liberum, and dissolve the association.
In the next few months, a Closed Control Access Centre (CCAC) is supposed to open on Lesvos. This is yet another camp surrounded by barbed wire fences and concrete walls, monitored around the clock, and located far away from the city.
The MARE LIBERUM gets a new assignment. We are handing over our ship to the activists of Zusammenland, who will operate it under the name MARE*GO and bring it back to the active civil fleet. Updates about the new operation will be announced in the upcoming months.
The EU undermines its own rule of law by trying to dismantle asylum laws. After years of human rights violations at the EU's external borders, the EU is now trying to legally legitimise those crimes for the first time.
Im Oktober 2020 überquerte Salam* zusammen mit 15 Menschen aus Syrien und Afghanistan den Fluss Evros von Edirne in der Türkei nach Griechenland. Sie liefen bis zum nächsten Morgen durch den Wald auf der griechischen Seite des Grenzgebiets. Als sie sich ein paar Stunden ausruhten, wurden sie von der griechischen Grenzpolizei entdeckt. „Um 10 Uhr […]
Mare Liberum documents and monitors human rights violations against migrants that are regularly committed at the border between Turkey and Greece. Since 2020, there has been a sharp increase in violence at the border. On the one hand, regarding the number, but also regarding the brutality of these incidents.
We have to give away our ship. As Mare Liberum e.V. we deployed the equally named ship for human rights monitoring in the Aegean Sea. After various attempts to block the ship, the Greek government finally introduced a law, which makes it impossible for us to use the vessel for this cause anymore. Therefore, we offer it to any good use.
Violent pushbacks are systematically carried out at European land and sea borders and constitute a fundamental part of the inhumane border regime of the EU. This article summarises eight testimonies of pushback survivors in Greece and contextualises them with public data on pushbacks and migration in the Aegean Sea, to reveal patterns of brutal pushback practices on Greek coasts.
People on the move are criminalised, journalists intimidated and solidarity structures are increasingly attacked. With repressive laws and criminal charges on flimsy grounds, the Greek government is trying to cover up its human rights crimes and silence critical voices.
The human rights activists of Mare Liberum are starting a new project, this time on land. The focus of the new project continues to be the observation of human rights violations and border violence.