The external borders of the European Union registered more than 120,000 cases of pushback by national authorities against irregular migrants in 2024, according to a new report by a group of nine human rights organizations. The report, released on Monday morning, lays bare the extent of the pushbacks in Europe, the illegal practice of expelling migrants to prevent access to the asylum procedure, a right enshrined in both EU and international law. By collecting data from government services, NGOs and research groups, the coalition concluded that last year "at least" 120,457 pushbacks had taken place, meaning migrants were removed from national territory without being able to submit their application for international protection and having an individual assessment. The removal was "often" done with violence, the report notes, with asylum seekers being beaten by border guards, abandoned at sea or left dying of cold in the forest. The total number of 120,457 refers to pushbacks from EU countries towards non-EU countries, excluding incidents between member states. (Migrants who were pushed back on different occasions were counted separately.) Bulgaria leads the 2024 ranking, with 52,534 pushbacks towards Turkey. Frontex, the EU's border agency, is said to be "kept away" from areas where pushbacks are alleged to take place, limiting the effectiveness of its Fundamental Rights Officer. Bulgaria is followed by Greece (14,482), Poland (13,600), Hungary (5,713), Latvia (5,388), Croatia (1,905) and Lithuania (1,002). The study also covered Libya (21,762) and Lebanon (3,768) because the interceptions (or, more precisely, "pullbacks") carried out by these nations were done with "direct and extensive" support from Italy, Cyprus and the EU institutions. In May 2024, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen travelled to Beirut to announce €1 billion in assistance for Lebanon to manage the flows of irregular migration and sustain the economy of the crisis-stricken country. Pushbacks have long been a recurrent topic of contention in the bloc, particularly after the 2015-2016 migration crisis, and have fuelled continued criticism against border guards, prompting internal investigations, media revelations and lawsuits. "The number of pushbacks at Europe's external borders has risen sharply in recent years, to the extent that they have become a systematic practice within EU migration policy," the report says in its preface. "The ongoing reports of pushbacks indicate a systematic failure on behalf of the EU to enforce respect for one of the most fundamental human rights." A similar language was used by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), which last month found Grece guilty of conducting "systematic" pushbacks against asylum seekers. Last week, the Strasbourg-based court began hearing three cases against Poland, Latvia and Lithuania over allegations of pushbacks to Belarus, marking the first time the ECHR examined a case related to the instrumentalisation of migration. The EU has accused Belarusian President Aleksander Lukashenko of deliberately luring in migrants from faraway countries to Minsk and guiding them towards Eastern Europe in an attempt to sow chaos and polarise societies. In response to Lukashenko's schemes, Poland has prepared new legislation to suspend the right to asylum temporarily. After initially criticising the Polish plan, the European Commission eventually relented and published guidelines to enable the suspension of fundamental rights in "exceptional situations," such as instrumentalisation by foreign actors. The exemption will also apply to Finland, which has approved emergency legislation legalising pushbacks. NGOs have raised the alarm about the progressive "securitisation" of migration, warning that migrants have the right to access the asylum procedure whether they travel to Europe of their own volition or as pawns in a geopolitical game. In a statement to Euronews, a spokesperson of the Polish Ministry of Interior said border guards are "entitled to use means of physical coercion and firearms" when faced with attacks against their physical integrity and the "inviolability of the state border." The Ministry says migrants instrumentalised by Belarus have become increasingly equipped with dangerous tools and "aggressive" in their behaviour. Last year, a Polish soldier died after being stabbed by a migrant at the border with Belarus. "Orchestrated migration is a process that neither international law nor Polish law could have foreseen," the spokesperson said. The report released on Monday was a collaborative effort between 11.11.11 (Belgium), the Hungarian Helsinki Committee (Hungary), We Are Monitoring Association (Poland), the Center for Peace Studies (Croatia), the Lebanese Center for Human Rights (CLDH), Sienos Grupė (Lithuania), the Centre for Legal Aid – Voice in Bulgaria (CLA), the Foundation Mission Wings (Bulgaria) and I Want to Help Refugees (Latvia). — Euronews
