live webinar
How Greek Courts Criminalize Migrants
March 25, 2021 | 12:00 CT / 19:00 EET
Over the last ten years, the Greek Coast Guard and European Frontex have systematically arrested anyone driving boats ferrying migrants across the Mediterranean. Thousands have been arrested and are in pretrial detention centers and prisons, either serving their lengthy sentences or awaiting their trials. The imprisoned will most likely be convicted without a fair trial and a lack of evidence.
The Aegean Migrant Solidarity Team has monitored these trials since 2014 and visited those accused of human smuggling. In some cases, one-hundred-year long sentences are issued in trials not lasting more than ten minutes. A lack of legal representation often characterizes the hearings with bad or no interpretative services offered to the accused migrants.
The crossing of the Mediterranean Sea between Tunisia and Italy or the narrow straits between Greece and Turkey are often deadly. And those who make it to shore then need to deal with racism, violence and institutional incompetence, often resulting in confinement or deportation.
Join Christian Peacemaker Teams-Aegean Migrant Solidarity Team as they bring focus to the criminalization of migrants seeking safety in Europe. Speakers will focus on a personal experience and report on what they saw in prisons and courts and highlight the findings of a recent report they co-authored titled “Incarcerating the Marginalized.”
Speakers
Dariusz Firla is a community-worker and electrologist, now working with CPT’s partner organization Lesvos Solidarity. He is a former member of the AMS field team.
Rob Moloney is an independent Irish artist and activist who works in solidarity with people on the move. He is a former member of AMS.
Rûnbîr Serkepkanî is the program support coordinator of AMS and a former long-time member of the AMS field team.
Valeria Hänsel is part of the network for critical migration and border regime studies, and the Aegean team of the association bordermonitoring.eu. On the Greek hotspot islands, she works with support networks for people on the move. She is completing her Ph.D. at Georg-August University of Göttingen about the “Reconfiguration of the European border regime in the Aegean.”
