April, 01 2016, 09:00am EDT

For Immediate Release
Contact:
Tel: +44 (0) 20 7413 5566,After hours: +44 7778 472 126,Email:,press@amnesty.org
Turkey: Illegal Mass Returns of Syrian Refugees Expose Fatal Flaws in EU-Turkey Deal
WASHINGTON
Large-scale forced returns of refugees from Turkey to war-ravaged Syria expose the fatal flaws in a refugee deal signed between Turkey and the European Union earlier this month, Amnesty International revealed today.
New research carried out by the organization in Turkey's southern border provinces suggests that Turkish authorities have been rounding up and expelling groups of around 100 Syrian men, women and children to Syria on a near-daily basis since mid-January. Over three days last week, Amnesty International researchers gathered multiple testimonies of large-scale returns from Hatay province, confirming a practice that is an open secret in the region.
All forced returns to Syria are illegal under Turkish, EU and international law.
"In their desperation to seal their borders, EU leaders have wilfully ignored the simplest of facts: Turkey is not a safe country for Syrian refugees and is getting less safe by the day," said John Dalhuisen, Amnesty International's Director for Europe and Central Asia.
"The large-scale returns of Syrian refugees we have documented highlight the fatal flaws in the EU-Turkey deal. It is a deal that can only be implemented with the hardest of hearts and a blithe disregard for international law."
Far from pressuring Turkey to improve the protection it offers Syrian refugees, the EU is in fact incentivizing the opposite.Amnesty International's John Dalhuisen
The EU-Turkey deal paves the way for the immediate return to Turkey of Syrian refugees arriving on the Greek islands, on the grounds that it is safe country of asylum. EU officials have expressed the hope that returns could start as of Monday 4 April.
The EU's extended courting of Turkey that preceded the deal has already had disastrous knock-on effects on Turkey's own policies towards Syrian refugees.
"Far from pressuring Turkey to improve the protection it offers Syrian refugees, the EU is in fact incentivizing the opposite," said John Dalhuisen.
"It seems highly likely that Turkey has returned several thousand refugees to Syria in the last seven to nine weeks. If the agreement proceeds as planned, there is a very real risk that some of those the EU sends back to Turkey will suffer the same fate."
Children and a pregnant woman among those returned
One of the cases uncovered by Amnesty International is of three young children forced back into Syria without their parents; another is of the forced return of an eight-month pregnant woman.
"The inhumanity and scale of the returns is truly shocking; Turkey should stop them immediately," said John Dalhuisen.
Many of those returned to Syria appear to be unregistered refugees, though Amnesty International has also documented cases of registered Syrians being returned, when apprehended without their papers on them.
Syrian refugees denied registration
Amnesty International's recent research also shows that the Turkish authorities have scaled back the registration of Syrian refugees in the southern border provinces.
Registration is required to access basic services. In Gaziantep, Amnesty International met with the son of a woman requiring emergency surgery to save her life but who was denied the ability to register - and therefore have the surgery. She eventually was able to register elsewhere and receive the life-saving treatment.
Having witnessed the creation of Fortress Europe, we are now seeing the copy-cat construction of Fortress Turkey.Amnesty International's John Dalhuisen
According to other Syrian refugees in the border province of Hatay, some people attempting to register have been detained and forced back into Syria, together with refugees found without their registration documents.
Amnesty International spoke to a family of unregistered Syrian refugees in Hatay province who have opted to remain in their apartment rather than trying to register, for fear they will be returned to Syria.
There are currently around 200,000 displaced people within 20km of Turkey's border. According to humanitarian aid groups as well as camp residents, conditions in camps close to the border are abysmal, without clean water or sanitation. A camp resident reported kidnappings for ransom among the dangers.
Tighter border restrictions
Increased border security and the lack of any regular means of crossing have pushed people into the hands of smugglers, who are demanding at least US$1,000 per person to take people into Turkey, according to Syrian nationals Amnesty International spoke to on both sides of the border.
The increasingly restrictive border policies are a radical change from those adopted previously by the Turkish authorities during the five years of the Syrian crisis. Previously, Syrian residents with passports had been able to cross at regular border gates, and those who entered irregularly - the vast majority - were also able to register with the Turkish authorities.
"Over the last few months, Turkey has introduced visa requirements for Syrians arriving by air, sealed its land border with Syria for all but those in need of emergency medical care, and shot at some of those attempting to cross it irregularly," said John Dalhuisen.
"Now Turkey is touting the creation of an undeliverable safe zone inside Syria. It is clear where this is all heading: having witnessed the creation of Fortress Europe, we are now seeing the copy-cat construction of Fortress Turkey."
TESTIMONIES
A Syrian family whose children were forcibly returned to Syria
An extended family of 24 people lived together in a single apartment in Antakya, Hatay province. They told Amnesty International that five members of their family were forcibly returned to Syria on or around 20 February 2016.
Thirty-year-old M.Z., in Turkey since early 2015, had been able to register. His 20-year-old brother, M.A., and their 11 year-old nephew and two nieces, aged 10 and nine, had arrived in Turkey around two months previously and had not been able to register because they had been told that it was impossible, and that those who tried risked being sent back to Syria.
The two brothers were taking their nephew and nieces to the park to play when they were stopped by police, who demanded their identification papers. The police took all five Syrian refugees to a nearby police station.
Z.Z. - another of M.Z.'s brothers who lived with them in Antakya - told Amnesty International that after learning of their detention, he brought M.Z.'s registration card to the police station, but that the police refused to release any of them.
M.Z. told Amnesty International by phone from Syria that after being detained for a few hours, all five refugees were put on a bus and driven to the Cilvegozu / Bab al-Hawa border crossing in Hatay province.
They were not alone. M.Z. said that there were a total of seven buses, with about 30 people on each bus - mostly families - representing up to 210 Syrian refugees. Two police cars accompanied the buses, and M.Z. told Amnesty International that on his bus there was a Turkish soldier armed with an assault rifle.
M.Z.'s brother followed the buses to Bab al-Hawa but said he was not permitted to speak to his relatives. When they reached the border at about 3am, they were handed over to the Ahrar al Sham armed group. On the Syrian side, M.Z. told a soldier that he had no money to care for the three children. The soldier then drove them to Atma refugee camp, in Syria's Idlib province.
M.Z. does not know what happened to the other people on the buses. He describes conditions in the Atma camp as atrocious, with no running water or sanitation facilities and completely inadequate food supplies.
M.Z. said that the children have developed skin conditions and that since being in Atma his nephew has developed vision problems.
The five Syrians are still able to communicate with their family in Antakya by phone. The children's mother told Amnesty International, "They are crying all the time; when they talk I can't even understand what they are saying."
Aid groups reported in December 2015 that nearly 58,000 people were living in Atma camp. M.Z. told Amnesty International that he has tried to return to Turkey several times over the past month.
M.Z.'s family in Antakya told Amnesty International that smugglers would charge them about US$1,000 per person to cross, but M.Z. says he only has around 500 Syrian pounds (just over US$2).
Most of the remaining members of the family, including children, are unregistered and remain in their Antakya apartment for fear that they too could be returned to Syria. They rely on registered members of the family to bring supplies to the house.
Two men whose brother and his pregnant wife were returned to Syria
The two brothers said that around 3 March 2016, they were travelling in two cars with their brother and his wife, having crossed the Turkey-Syria border near Yayladagi in Hatay province the same day. About 3km into Turkish territory, Turkish border guards stopped the car in which their brother K.A. and his wife B.Q. were travelling. K.A. phoned his two brothers in the other car to tell them what had happened.
The two men explained to Amnesty International that their brother and sister-in-law were sent back to Syria in a van to the Cilvegozu / Bab al-Hawa border crossing in Hatay province, along with seven other vans carrying Syrian refugees. Each van allegedly transported around 14 people, which represents around 112 Syrian refugees. The brother and his now nine-month pregnant wife are living in Atma camp across from the Turkish border.
A man whose mother required emergency life-saving surgery
A Syrian man said his mother had not been permitted to register in Gaziantep, despite urgently requiring life-saving surgery that could only be accessed with registration.
A doctor had told him that every day that passed without the surgery would endanger his mother's life. After two weeks of trying to register in Gaziantep, showing numerous medical test results as proof of the urgency of the situation, they gave up and instead convinced the authorities to register her in Kilis, some 60km away. The mother was subsequently able to receive the free medical care she required.
A Syrian man in Azaz who was unlawfully pushed back from the border
The man had been part of a group of around 60 people trying to cross irregularly to Turkey on 20 February 2016. He said that they were apprehended by Turkish border guards and detained in a military barracks near Reyhanli in Hatay province.
He told Amnesty International he was detained for four hours, and that other people in the barracks (including women and children) were detained for up to 24 hours. He said that the border guards did not provide any food or water, nor access to toilets.
Amnesty International is a worldwide movement of people who campaign for internationally recognized human rights for all. Our supporters are outraged by human rights abuses but inspired by hope for a better world - so we work to improve human rights through campaigning and international solidarity. We have more than 2.2 million members and subscribers in more than 150 countries and regions and we coordinate this support to act for justice on a wide range of issues.
LATEST NEWS
Trump DOJ Attacks 'Fundamental Fabric' of Democracy by Gutting Voting Rights Unit
"The upheaval and loss of experience will leave the division unable to enforce the nation's civil rights laws," said one voting rights advocate.
Apr 29, 2025
U.S. President Donald Trump's Justice Department has reportedly gutted the leadership of the agency's voting rights unit and ordered attorneys to drop all active cases, the latest signal that the administration is hellbent on undercutting civil rights protections and abandoning federal enforcement of key election laws.
The Guardianreported Monday that Trump appointees at the Department of Justice "have removed all of the senior civil servants working as managers in the department's Voting Section," reassigning most of them to a DOJ office that handles employee complaints.
"Political appointees have also instructed career employees to dismiss all of their active cases without meeting with them and offering a rationale—a significant break with the department's practices and norms," The Guardian added.
Angelina Clapp, advocacy manager for election protection at Issue One, said in a statement Monday that "our democracy must be accessible for all eligible voters to participate in and make their voices heard, but these recent moves by President Trump's appointees at the Justice Department take us further away from those goals."
"This decision to dismiss all active cases threatens to erode public trust in the very department tasked with protecting Americans' freedom to vote and sends the message that the rule of law is not being upheld," said Clapp. "These actions are part of a broader trend of the second Trump administration dismantling and interfering with federal agencies dedicated to protecting our elections and democracy."
"In the end," Clapp added, "all Americans will suffer as a result of decisions like these because taken together, they undermine the fundamental fabric of our democracy—the idea that the government should be by, of, and for the people."
"If regular Americans think that this administration is going to protect their rights, they're just wrong."
The DOJ's Voting Section is housed within the department's Civil Rights Division, which is now led by Harmeet Dhillon, a lawyer who aided Trump's unsuccessful bid to overturn his 2020 election loss. Dhillon, who is not a civil rights attorney, was confirmed by the Republican-controlled Senate in a largely party-line vote earlier this month.
Since her confirmation, she has moved quickly to do Trump's bidding at the department, prompting a mass exodus of lawyers from the Civil Rights Division. CNNreported Monday that roughly 70% of division staffers are "expected to accept a second offer to federal workers that allows them to resign from their positions and be paid through September."
Joyce Vance, a former U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Alabama, wrote Monday that "when the career people, the experts at civil and criminal enforcement in this area, are removed from their positions, there is no one there to protect us."
"And as we've learned from Trump's deportations to El Salvador, when due process is denied to one person, we are all at risk," Vance added. "The news from the Justice Department tonight, on the eve of Trump's 100th day in office, is deeply disturbing."
The departures come after Dhillon issued a series of internal memos indicating, as NBC News put it, "a 180-degree shift in the direction of the department from its original mission: enforcing laws that prohibit discrimination in hiring, housing, and voting rights."
One unnamed Civil Rights Division lawyer who recently left their DOJ toldNBC News that "if regular Americans think that this administration is going to protect their rights, they're just wrong."
The progressive advocacy group Common Cause noted Tuesday that the DOJ's Voting Section "enforces the federal laws protecting the right to vote, including the Voting Rights Act, the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, the National Voter Registration Act, the Help America Vote Act, and the Civil Rights Act."
Omar Noureldin, Common Cause's senior vice president for policy and litigation, said Monday that "the Trump administration’s gutting of the Voting Section of the Civil Rights Division is doing profound and lasting damage to the protection of voting rights in the United States."
"The removal and reassignment of the section's leadership and the dismissal of cases are themselves attacks on the voting rights of every American," said Noureldin. "Attorney General Pam Bondi's systematic removal of career attorneys and staff is not confined to the voting section—it extends to the entire Civil Rights Division. The upheaval and loss of experience will leave the division unable to enforce the nation's civil rights laws."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Trump Is Trying to Break Us,' Carney Warns as Liberals Win Canadian Election
"As I have been warning for months, America wants our land, our resources, our water, our country," said Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney. "That will never, ever happen."
Apr 29, 2025
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney declared that his country's "old relationship with the United States... is over" after leading his Liberal Party to victory in Monday's federal election, a contest that came amid U.S. President Donald Trump's destructive trade war and threats to forcibly annex Canada.
"As I have been warning for months, America wants our land, our resources, our water, our country. But these are not idle threats," Carney, a former central banker who succeeded Justin Trudeau as Canada's prime minister last month, said after he was projected the winner of Monday's election.
On the day of the contest, Trump reiterated his desire to make Canada "the cherished 51st. State of the United States of America."
"President Trump is trying to break us so that America can own us," Carney said Monday. "That will never, ever happen."
Carney: President Trump is trying to break us so that America can own us. That will never, ever happen pic.twitter.com/dUEI0YGSM2
— Acyn (@Acyn) April 29, 2025
It's not yet clear whether the Liberal Party will secure enough seats for a parliamentary majority, but its victory Monday was seen as a stunning comeback after the party appeared to be spiraling toward defeat under Trudeau's leadership.
Pierre Poilievre, the head of Canada's Conservative Party, looked for much of the past year to be "cruising to one of the largest majority governments in Canada's history," The Washington Postnoted.
But on Monday, Poilievre—who was embraced by Trump allies, including mega-billionaire Elon Musk—lost his parliamentary seat to his Liberal opponent, Bruce Fanjoy.
Vox's Zack Beauchamp wrote Tuesday that "Trump has single-handedly created the greatest surge of nationalist anti-Americanism in Canada's history as an independent country," pointing to a recent survey showing that "61% of Canadians are currently boycotting American-made goods."
"Trump's aggressive economic policy isn't, as he claimed, making America Great or respected again. Instead, it's having the opposite effect: turning longtime allies into places where campaigning against American leadership is a winning strategy," Beauchamp added. "If we are indeed witnessing the beginning of the end of the American-led world order, the history books will likely record April 28, 2025, as a notable date—one where even America's closest ally started eying the geopolitical exits."
Keep ReadingShow Less
US Led 'Unprecedented' Surge in Global Military Spending in 2024
"As governments increasingly prioritize military security, often at the expense of other budget areas, the economic and social trade-offs could have significant effects on societies for years to come," said one expert.
Apr 28, 2025
Military spending worldwide soared to $2.718 trillion last year, meaning it "has increased every year for a full decade, going up by 37% between 2015 and 2024," according to an annual report released Monday.
The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) has tracked conflict, disarmament, and weapons for nearly six decades. Its 2024 spending report states that "for the second year in a row, military expenditure increased in all five of the world's geographical regions, reflecting heightened geopolitical tensions across the globe."
In a Monday statement, Xiao Liang, a researcher with the SIPRI Military Expenditure and Arms Production Program, highlighted that "over 100 countries around the world raised their military spending in 2024."
"It was the highest year-on-year increase since the end of the Cold War."
"This was really unprecedented... It was the highest year-on-year increase since the end of the Cold War," Liang told Agence France-Press, while acknowledging that there may have been larger jumps during the Cold War but Soviet Union data is not available.
Liang warned that "as governments increasingly prioritize military security, often at the expense of other budget areas, the economic and social trade-offs could have significant effects on societies for years to come."
The United States—whose Republican lawmakers are currently cooking up a plan to give even more money to a Pentagon that's never passed an audit—led all countries, with $997 billion in military spending. The report points out that the U.S. not only allocated "3.2 times more than the second-largest spender," but also "accounted for 37% of global military expenditure in 2024 and 66% of spending by North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) members."
In the second spot was China, with an estimated $314 billion in spending. Nan Tian, director of the SIPRI Military Expenditure and Arms Production Program, raised the alarm about spending in Asia.
"Major military spenders in the Asia-Pacific region are investing increasing resources into advanced military capabilities," said Tian. "With several unresolved disputes and mounting tensions, these investments risk sending the region into a dangerous arms-race spiral."
In third place was Russia, with an estimated $149 billion in spending. Russia remains at war after launching a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Rounding out the top five were Germany ($88.5 billion) and India ($86.1 billion).
They were followed by the United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, Ukraine, France, Japan, South Korea, Israel, Poland, Italy, and Australia. The report says that "together, the top 15 spenders in 2024 accounted for 80% of global military spending ($2,185 billion) and for 79% of the total increase in spending over the year. All 15 increased their military spending in 2024."
"The two largest year-on-year percentage increases among this group were in Israel (+65%) and Russia (+38%), highlighting the effect of major conflicts on spending trends in 2024," the publication continues. Israel has been engaged in a U.S.-backed military assault on the Gaza Strip—globally condemned as genocide—since October 2023.
"Russia once again significantly increased its military spending, widening the spending gap with Ukraine," noted SIPRI researcher Diego Lopes da Silva. "Ukraine currently allocates all of its tax revenues to its military. In such a tight fiscal space, it will be challenging for Ukraine to keep increasing its military spending."
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday announced an upcoming three-day truce to celebrate the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe. In response, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for an immediate monthlong cease-fire.
All NATO members boosted military spending last year, which SIPRI researcher Jade Guiberteau Ricard said was "driven mainly by the ongoing Russian threat and concerns about possible U.S. disengagement within the alliance."
"It is worth saying that boosting spending alone will not necessarily translate into significantly greater military capability or independence from the USA," the expert added. "Those are far more complex tasks."
Another SIPRI researcher, Lorenzo Scarazzato, highlighted that "for the first time since reunification Germany became the biggest military spender in Western Europe, which was due to the €100 billion special defense fund announced in 2022."
"The latest policies adopted in Germany and many other European countries suggest that Europe has entered a period of high and increasing military spending that is likely to continue for the foreseeable future," Scarazzato said.
As for the Middle East, SIPRI researcher Zubaida Kari said that "despite widespread expectations that many Middle Eastern countries would increase their military spending in 2024, major rises were limited to Israel and Lebanon."
In addition to slaughtering at least tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza over the past nearly 19 months, Israel has killed thousands of people in Lebanon while allegedly targeting the political and paramilitary group Hezbollah. Kari said that elsewhere in the region, "countries either did not significantly increase spending in response to the war in Gaza or were prevented from doing so by economic constraints."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular