IV. Background

The Geography of Migration: the Greek Gateway to the EU

Routes of irregular migration are constantly shifting; as immigration enforcement measures stiffen in one area migrants and smugglers probe and test for other soft points of entry.  But two factors rarely change-the political boundaries that delineate international borders and the topography that makes one frontier porous and another impenetrable.  Not only because Greece stretches into the eastern Mediterranean, but also because it has 1,17o kilometers of land borders and 18,400 kilometers of coastline, including islands in close proximity to Turkey, Greece is likely to remain an attractive entry point into the EU.  With an eastern frontier bounded by the Caucasus Mountains and the Black Sea in the North and the Mediterranean in the south, Turkey effectively funnels migrants traveling overland from the Middle East and South Asia into Greece, while Africans are increasingly coming to Greece via Egypt. 

Increase in Apprehensions

Stiffened interdiction measures in the western and central Mediterranean since 2005 appear to have contributed to shifting irregular migration routes toward Greece.  While the number of irregular boat arrivals to Spain dropped by 53.9 percent from 2006 to 2007,[4] irregular boat arrivals to Greece increased by 267 percent during this same time period.[5]  At this same time when irregular boat arrivals to Greece were almost tripling, they were also decreasing in Italy and Malta.[6]   It is difficult to weigh all the variables for shifts in irregular migration patterns, but the rapporteur for the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly's Committee on Migration, Refugees and Population suggests that the shift away from Spain and Italy and toward Greece in 2007 was at least partly because "increased sea controls, including by FRONTEX,[7] …almost certainly had an impact, in particular during the periods the operations have been in operation."[8] 

Greek police recorded 112,369 arrests for illegal entry or presence in 2007, more than double the number apprehended in 2003.[9]  However, Human Rights Watch believes that the true number of apprehensions is much larger. Many, perhaps most, of the apprehensions in the border region are not recorded at all.  After apprehending migrants in the border region, police detain them for a period of days without registering them. The police take these uncounted and unregistered migrants to the Evros River at nightfall and forcibly and secretly return them to the Turkish side.  In addition to these numbers are the migrants that the Coast Guard apprehends and pushes back from Greek territorial waters.

Increase in Asylum Applications

 Although relatively few of the migrants apprehended in Greece seek asylum, the number of asylum seekers has been increasing dramatically.  As recently as 2004, Greece received a modest 4,500 asylum applications, but by 2007 the number of asylum claims had increased fivefold to more than 25,000, of whom 5,500 were Iraqi claimants.[10]  In 2007, Greece was the fourth largest recipient of new asylum claims in the EU, exceeded only by Sweden, France, and the United Kingdom (UK).[11]   Although EU member states saw an 11 percent increase in the number of asylum seekers from 2006 to 2007, Greece saw a 105 percent increase during this period.[12] 

From Human Rights Watch interviews with Iraqis and other migrants in Greece, this increase ought to be attributed less to a recent preference among asylum seekers to lodge protection claims in Greece but rather to the blocking of other options; once fingerprinted in Greece, many asylum seekers lose hope of being able to seek asylum in their preferred destinations in Sweden, the UK, Germany, and other countries.

The EU has frustrated the preferred destinations of asylum seekers through a regulation known as Dublin II, which since February 2003 (and building on the framework of the earlier Dublin Convention, which has been in force since 1997) establishes that the Member State responsible for examining asylum claims will generally be the one in which an asylum seeker first sets foot.[13]  Although both Greece and the Iraqi asylum seekers appear to agree on their preference that Iraqis not stay in Greece but rather seek asylum in countries to the west and north, in fact, Iraqi asylum seekers find themselves stuck in Greece-they can't move onward because of Dublin II, they can't move back home because of a fear of war and persecution, but they are almost never granted asylum in Greece.  In 2007, the approval rate for asylum seekers was 0.04 percent in first-instance interviews.[14]