III. Violence against Children by State Agents

The previous chapter has described the near routine failure of the police to carry out rigorous age and vulnerability assessment-including identifying whether children are unaccompanied in the first place. Even worse, many of the unaccompanied children, in addition to numerous adults, interviewed by Human Rights Watch described violence and ill-treatment at the hands of police, port police, coastguards or border guards-the very officials with lead responsibility for their protection.

This generally took place close to the moment of arrest. Children spoke about ill-treatment taking place during interception at sea and during arrest or detention. Human Rights Watch documented allegations of beatings, slaps, kicks, and punches. Extraordinarily, one child reported being subjected to a mock execution. Several children interviewed said they suffered from health problems resulting from such acts.

In 2007 the European Committee on the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT) reported numerous allegations of ill-treatment by persons, including migrants, in the custody of state agents and concluded that "persons deprived of their liberty by law enforcement officials in Greece run a real risk of being ill-treated."[91]

Ill-Treatment by Port Police Officers in Patras

Some of the most dramatic testimony Human Rights Watch collected relates to the behavior of port police officers in the town of Patras, an important terminal for ferries leaving for Ancona, Bari and Venice and hence a jumping off point for travel to other parts of the EU.

Migrants apprehended inside the port area who had tried to hide on a truck or a ferry departing for Italy consistently spoke of ill-treatment and beatings by Patras port police officers. Human Rights Watch interviewed two adult Afghan migrants who suffered injuries after having allegedly been beaten by the port police the same day. Both persons had visible wounds and required medical treatment.[92]

Children are not spared from such ill-treatment. Habib T., a 13-year-old Afghan who was caught hiding in a truck in spring 2008, reported:

The police took me from inside the truck. Three police officers took my fingerprints. They beat me…. they beat me on my arms and my back. They beat me four times – there's no traces left now. My back shoulder still hurts. At night when I am sleeping it starts hurting.[93]

Fourteen-year-old Daoud A. from Afghanistan was caught inside the port fence:

They were two policemen. They handcuffed me, put me into the (vehicle) trunk, closed it and brought me to the port police building…. They put on gloves and searched me. They took everything from me except for my clothes and put me inside a room with other persons and closed the door…. I was arrested with another underage boy. We were both thrown into the trunk.[94]

Human Rights Watch researchers received testimony that a port police officer known to migrants in Patras by the nickname 'Jabar' subjected one child to a mock execution, with the participation of other officials. Human Rights Watch also documented another case of serious ill-treatment that appears to have been carried out by the same officer. The two testimonies were recorded on different days, in different locations, and with the assistance of different interpreters. Both children gave similar physical descriptions of their main assailant.

Fifteen-year-old Ghulam S., who has been caught a number of times by port police officers attempting to hide in trucks, reported,

Once they caught me inside the port. That was two months ago at 4 a.m. I tried to find a place to hide inside a truck. They came with a car and I didn't see them arrive. Four of them in uniforms came from different sides. Jabar was among them. They forced me to lie flat on the ground with my arms stretched out. One guy pressed my head down with his boot… then he called the others to kick me and they all kicked me. They kicked me one after the other for about five minutes. Then they tied my hands on the back and took me to the railway line. They were still the four of them.

Jabar pulled out his gun. He loaded the gun held it to my head and said 'I will kill you.' He pulled the trigger but the gun was empty. I saw that they took out the bullets but they didn't realize that I had seen it. Afterwards they asked me how old I was. I said I was 14. They all started laughing. Then they told me to leave and run fast. They came running after me and shouted to scare me.… I couldn't lie on my back because of the beating. It hurt so badly. My friends took care of me.[95]

Sixteen-year-old Jafar F. told us how he was subjected to ill-treatment jointly with two other boys by a group of four port police officers, among them 'Jabar':

They arrested me. First they threw my bag into the sea and then [us]. They took us out and beat us. I was thrown inside the sea, taken out, and beaten, thrown into the water again, taken out, and beaten again. They were four police officers. That was one month ago…. The other boys were [name withheld] and [name withheld]. [Name withheld] is so young, he is 15, [name withheld] is 15 or 16.[96]

Neither of these boys, nor any other person we have spoken to attempted to file a complaint about the behavior of port police officers. When we asked Ghulam S. whether he had tried to lodge a complaint, he said: "there was nobody to complain to."[97]

Indeed, the way in which the authorities investigated the multiple stabbing of 14-year-old Ismail F., an unaccompanied child from Afghanistan, inside the port premises in November 2007, reinforces the rationality of Ghulam S.'s perspective.

According to various sources, a person in uniform stabbed Ismail F. several times with a sharp object while he was hiding under a truck.[98] He was taken to a hospital and received medical treatment. A medical examination of the boy's injuries first concluded that the boy had been hit by a blunt and heavy object. Two months later the hospital revised the medical report to conclude his injuries were caused by a sharp object.[99] The Hellenic Red Cross provided legal assistance to the boy and to a second witness who was also underage and helped them to file a complaint.[100] The case was also brought to the attention of the Greek Ombudsman.

During a pre-investigation by the responsible office of the Ministry of Mercantile Marine, the two boys were asked to identify the perpetrator from among only two officers presented to them. No victim protection mechanism was put in place and the boys were visible during the identification procedure. They did not identify either officer as a perpetrator. They were also not referred to any safe housing by the state for the duration of the investigation.

The Greek Ombudsman demanded that the port police thoroughly investigate the allegations and present all 30 staff to the boys. Ministry of Mercantile Marine officials, the ministry in charge of port police, however, refused this request.[101] Both Ismail F. and the witness soon afterwards departed from Greece. Sources close to them told Human Rights Watch that he and the witness were very scared and another source said they might have received help to leave the country.[102] Nobody has yet been charged for the crime.

Ismail F.'s wounds © 2007 Human Rights Watch    

Ismail F.'s wounds © 2007 Human Rights Watch             

Other Cases of Abuse by State Agents

Several migrant children (and adults) told us that Greek border guards beat and kicked them after they were intercepted in the Aegean Sea while trying to cross into Greece on boats.[103] Seventeen-year-old Abdul G. remembered the precise date when he was intercepted off the coast of Lesvos:

That was on April 24, 2008…. Four coastguard police were on the coastguard boat. It was about 10 meters long. Maybe the color of their uniform was blue, but I'm not sure. I couldn't recognize the color at night. When the police took us on their ship they searched our pockets and threw our clothes into the water….

One person, maybe he was the captain, didn't beat us. Two others beat us. The third beat us a little. I thought the first person was the captain because he was standing in the cabin. They slapped me two or three times and kicked me one or two times. Because I was underage, they beat me less. They beat the other men with the handle of their guns and kicked them a lot, maybe eight or ten times. Each person got injured; one in the back, some in the neck, others in the leg.[104]

Fourteen-year-old Lal S. told Human Rights Watch that he had been beaten by coastguards off Lesvos Island at the end of 2007: "They kicked me in the head. I was dizzy. I fell down. I felt the first kick to my head and then I lost consciousness. The first kick was to the side of my head. I couldn't see how the police kicked the others; three of them were my age and one was a year younger."[105]

Sixteen-year-old Najib M. also remembered the date of his interception at sea and described the beatings:

It was the night from May 19 to May 20.… We were about two hours away from Leros Island when we got arrested. They threw a rope down to us and told us to go onto their ship. When we got onto the ship they beat us. We fell into the sea. Then they threw the rope down again.

Four times I tried to get onto the ship. My friends even more. When we wanted to climb onto the ship they kicked us with the boot and we fell down. They kicked me until I fell down. Then they threw the rope again. After we got onto the ship they beat us on the ship. My cousin got punched in his eye and he has problems until now…. He is 15 years old.… There were 10-12 police officers on the ship. It was a big ship…. They were in military clothes and had Kalashnikovs. All of them had the same uniform.[106]

Other unaccompanied children reported being subjected to beatings while coming into contact with police in other contexts. Fifteen-year-old Nurullah F., an asylum seeker from Afghanistan, told Human Rights Watch that police beat him severely during an arrest near Omonia square.[107] He said that he has been in pain ever since:

One day we sold clothes on the streets…. The police caught us and took 50 T-shirts …. That was eight months ago in Omonia square. They kicked me several times inside the police car while the car was driving. One police man was on my left side, one was in the front. The officer in the front kicked me. He kicked me several times, for about 15-20 minutes…. The car was a van like a Pajero but I don't know its brand. I was taken to the police station near Omonia. The police beat me all over my body and 2-3 kicks into my chest. Since then I had that problem. I cannot carry anything heavy or else I feel pain.… At night I cannot sleep on my belly. I can only sleep on my back. When I sleep on my left side I feel pain in my chest.[108]

Legal Standards on Torture, Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment

International human rights law unambiguously bans torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. It is widely recognized to be a binding and absolute norm of customary international law from which no derogation is permitted. Torture is defined as any act by which severe pain or suffering is intentionally inflicted on a person with the consent or acquiescence of a public official, for a purpose such as obtaining information, punishing for an act, or for any discrimination-based reason.[109]

A mock execution is a form of torture. The acts by Patras port police, as alleged by Najib M. and Jafar F., would constitute at least cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. By repeatedly throwing victims into the water and beating them, perpetrators demonstrated that they were in complete control. The victims had a real fear of drowning and do not know whether they will be pulled out of the water again; the possibility of a child's drowning as a result of such ill-treatment is real.

Greece is a state party to the UN Convention against Torture, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the European Convention on Human Rights, which all prohibit the use of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.[110]