The respondent is a 23-year-old Moroccan man who experienced a violent chain pushback from Bulgaria to Greece, and then Greece to Turkey on the 18th of November, 2021. 

The respondent started walking at 6 pm for about 3 hours from near Bosna on the 14th of November 2021. At around 9 pm he and a group of 6 Moroccan men, aged between 23 – 36, arrived close to the Turkish – Greek border. In Greece, the group walked for 2 days for 90 km, resting during the day. After two days and one night, on the 17th of November at around 5 am, they arrived at the Bulgarian-Greek border. The group crossed the border between Zoni, Greece and Drabishna, Bulgaria. Once in Bulgarian territory, they continued walking for 20 km. That night (17th of November), they stopped to rest in a forest near Pokrovan in Bulgaria. Suddenly, around 10 pm, the respondent explains that they heard a dog barking and were woken up by dogs attacking them. The dogs continued to attack and bite the transit group for 20 minutes. While being attacked, the respondent shouted “peace, please sir camp.” Six officers were reportedly standing aside, and kept laughing and watching the respondent and the other men scream from pain. Only after 20 minutes did they stop their dogs from attacking the men. Two officers were described to be dressed in a bulletproof Sacramento green jacket and pants, and two in a black uniform jacket with “border police” written in English on their backs. They were also reportedly armed with firearms and had two large dogs.

According to the respondent, once the officers stopped their dogs attacking the group, they started beating the men by using a plastic baton. After that, they started searching them one by one, asking first for their phones and then gathered all their belongings in one place. The respondent explained that everybody had to get completely undressed so that the officers could search the pockets. They reportedly were naked naked for 30 minutes. The officers took their phones, power banks, clothes, and shoes. Only their t-shirts and pants were later returned to the transit group.

The officers asked them to walk for 15 minutes to get into the cars which were parked on an unpaved road down the hill. They reportedly drove a black land rover and a black jeep, the respondent confirmed the car to look like the vehicle illustrated below. 

The respondent reported that the officers kept hitting him and the other men to push them faster in the trunk of the Jeep, which was estimated to be 2 by 1 meters in size. All of the 6 men were loaded in the trunk. The trunk was too small and all of them were crammed in together. As it was dark, the respondent couldn’t see anything from the outside. The drive to the border, which took about 15 minutes in total (5 minutes on paved roads, 10 minutes on unpaved roads), was reckless and fast. The pushback location was near Ivaylovgrad in Bulgaria, based on the distance to Doxa in Greece.

Only one car left the previous site and arrived near the border, 2 officers who were dressed in black drove the Jeep. These two officers, who were talking only in English throughout the whole time,  asked the respondent to get out of the trunk and said “This way Europe”. That was at about 1 am, on the 18th of November 2021. The surrounding area was a small forest that the group passed through within 5 minutes. Once in Greece, they found an agricultural field and started walking in a random direction as they didn’t know where they were.  

In Greek territory, they walked for 4 hours walking without shoes, trying to find out where they were. They reached a paved road and found a sign for Doxa written in English and Greek letters. The group reportedly rested next to a road near the village for 2 hours until the sun began to rise (around 7 am). Cars and people were crossing by and parked next to them. Some people reportedly gave water and biscuits or stuff they had in the car to support. One car driver that the group met reportedly spoke Greek and called the police, who arrived one hour later. 2 men arrived, dressed in deep blue shirts and pants, and started asking in English about the respondent’s papers, where he is from, and where about to go. “Police” was reportedly written in English and Greek letters on the uniform. The respondent recognized the uniform from the following picture: 

The car was reportedly a white and blue Nissan, which looked like the following. 

The respondent said that these two officers spoke English with the respondent and the other men and Greek among each other. They waited for 30 minutes until a red van with an old door came and the officers forced the transit group to enter the van. The 2 men driving the red Mercedes van were wearing civilian clothing, pants, and shirts. The interior of the van was dirty and they found Turkish Lira on the floor, which according to the respondent, could have been from other people who had been held or loaded in the trunk before. 

The respondent reported that nothing about the van indicated it to be a police car. The van took the group to a detention site. The drive took about 1-hour along paved roads driving quite fast. As the trunk was locked from all sides, they couldn’t see where exactly they were being taken. The trunk was estimated to be 3 by 2 meters in size.

At approximately 11 am they arrived at the detention site which was reportedly surrounded by a forest. 7 officers, all dressed in olive green shirts and pants, with yellow “police” letters in English on their back, were described to be present at the site. 

2 fully filled garbage boxes were in front of the house, full of bags of people-on-the-move and shoes. Inside, the respondent described that there was a big dirty room and a small room in order to search for women. The big room was reportedly used to search the men and make them undress. 

The officers searched the 6 men in the big room, reportedly made them get fully undressed, and looked for money. According to the respondent, the men stayed completely naked for 30 minutes. 

The respondent recounted that the officers slapped him and others from the transit group to force them to get into the cell. Inside the cell, a Syrian family consisting of a mother and her daughters were already held inside. The cell itself was estimated to be around 5 by 8 meters in size, the ground dirty and the walls very old. The toilet was too dirty to be used. 

For 10 hours the respondent had to wait with the others in that cell. Every 30 minutes the officers reportedly brought between 3 to 5 people, so that in total about 200 people were held in a cell of 5 by 8 meters in size. Most of them were described to be Afghan, while some were Syrian and Iraqi, Algeria, Moroccan, Palestinian and Egypt. The age range was estimated to be between 3 – 60 years, with about 20 minors were among the group and 6 women. Some of the minors were with their parents, some were alone. 

Around 10 pm, the respondent explained that they were taken out of the cell by two officers who opened the door of the cell, reportedly holding a baton and started hitting everyone to get them out of the cell. The respondent described that they also hit minors with the branch. The uniform of the officers was described as a black jacket and olive green pants. Most of them were wearing balaclavas. 

The respondent continued to explain that around 15 officers were waiting outside, some in sage green jackets and pants, some in civilian clothing, and others again in blue uniform. Only the green uniform had a Greek flag stitched on their arm sleeves. The officers were reportedly armed with branches and most of them were wearing balaclavas. 

The respondent described that 3 vans were parked outside, including the one which brought the respondent to the detention site. The other 2 were white.

70 people were then loaded in one van – reportedly too many people for those inside to be able to breathe properly. The drive took about 20 minutes on an unpaved road and transported the people next to a river. There was a forest that hid the group from the Turkish side. Then the officers reportedly started splitting the group into smaller groups, each of them being told to give the officers all that they had left (phones or hidden money). 

All of the 200 were brought to the same point, so all the vans took the same route. 13 other officers were described to be waiting at the riverside. They were reportedly dressed in blue uniform pants and jackets, also olive green jackets and pants and civilian clothes. Only some officers were wearing olive green balaclavas. The respondent noted that some had the Greek flag stitched to their arms.

According to the respondent, these officers started hitting everyone with a baton and told them to stay quiet, including the children. Everybody was hit with a branch for several seconds. They started searching for the group again. One 17-year-old Syrian boy was asked where he was from. When he responded that he was from Syria, he was reportedly beaten for 10 minutes until he couldn’t move. “Just because he is from Syria”. Women and minors were also reportedly searched by male officers. Besides English and Greek the respondent could identify the languages Turkish and Arabic being spoken by the officers. The ones who spoke Turkish and Arabic were dressed in civilian clothes and balaclavas. 

1 hour passed between arriving at the riverside and getting on the boats, it was the 18th of November, 2022 around midnight. 3 small plastic boats of approximately 2 by 2 meters size were prepared, clear grey from the inside and deep grey from the outside. 8 – 9 people were loaded on one boat, accompanied by 2 drivers per boat wearing civilian clothes and speaking Arabic. 

The boat was unstable, and the respondent recalls being afraid of water entering the vessel. One of the drivers reportedly hit people on the boat on the head and ordered them not to move. In the middle of the river there was a small sandy island which they were brought to. The boats went back and forth several times to get all the 200 people. 

The respondent was in the last transit group, and said that most of the people who were pushed back had been held at the detention site before but not all of them. Women and children were also left on the island in the middle of the river.

From the island, it was difficult to cross to the Turkish side of the river as the water levels were quite high, due to the time of year, and the children could not cross. The respondent explained that members of the group started carrying the kids and women so they could cross the river. 

From the riverside, they walked to Umurca, Turkey, and entered a village to ask for help but everything was closed. They continued walking to Meric, and from there continued, still shoeless and without warm clothes, towards Edirne. “It was so cold”. They kept walking for 8 hours and slept somewhere in Yeniköy in an abandoned house. 

That was the 19th of November at around 11 am, the group spent a day resting in the abandoned house before they continued walking for another 3 hours. Then they got on a taxi which took them to Edirne, where they arrived at 1 pm on the 20th of November. 

The respondent and members of the group asked for asylum in Greece. No food or water nor medical assistance was provided. “They didn’t give us medicine, they beat us to see us broken from everywhere. Do you think they can afford that for people who they consider animals?”