Greece's Dark Border Tactics: Masked Migrants as Tools of Pushback

Tue Apr 14 2026 10:12:37 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)

An alarming investigation reveals Greece's use of migrants to execute illegal border pushbacks, spotlighting systemic abuses at the Evros border with Turkey.

Recent reports have uncovered serious human rights abuses on the Greek-Turkish border, where police are allegedly recruiting migrants to forcibly push back others seeking asylum. Witness accounts describe brutality, including beatings and sexual assaults, raising significant legal and ethical concerns regarding Greece's handling of migration. The Greek government denies knowledge of these practices, despite compelling evidence and prior investigations highlighting the use of mercenaries. As the EU grapples with its migration policies, these findings challenge the commitment to human rights at the continent's borders.

Greece's Dark Border Tactics: Masked Migrants as Tools of Pushback

An alarming investigation reveals Greece's use of migrants to execute illegal border pushbacks, spotlighting systemic abuses at the Evros border with Turkey. Police in Greece have reportedly been recruiting migrants to violently push other migrants back across the border, according to evidence uncovered by the BBC.

Internal police documents indicate that senior officers ordered the recruitment of these so-called mercenaries. Witnesses report a pattern of brutality, detailing instances where migrants were stripped, robbed, beaten, and even subjected to sexual assaults. Such practices are claimed to have been in place since at least 2020.

While Greece's Prime Minister claimed to be 'totally unaware' of these allegations, the country's authorities have remained silent in response to requests for comment regarding these serious accusations. Pushbacks—forcing migrants back without due process—are considered illegal under international law.

This troubling practice has reportedly involved foreign masked men as described in past reports by the Netherlands-based Lighthouse Reports. The BBC's investigation, carried out in collaboration with the Consolidated Rescue Group, has collected disturbing video evidence of migrants being mistreated by these individuals.

Interviews with migrants, ex-mercenaries, and police sources reveal that these mercenaries, often fellow migrants seeking a way through, have been incentivized with cash, looted phones, and even passage papers through Greece.

According to a police source from the Evros region, mercenaries have pushed back hundreds of people weekly, with few unaware of the ongoing violations. The brutal nature of such practices constitutes a 'significant' abuse of human rights, stressing the need for urgent scrutiny of Greece's migration policies.

The Evros border has experienced over one million migrant arrivals since 2015, primarily through sea routes and on land. The river itself, a heavily militarized area, defines the European Union's outer boundary, separating Greece from Turkey. Several accounts by Syrian migrants recount harrowing experiences during their pushbacks, further underlining the dire situation at the border.