Admissibility procedure

Author

Greek Council for Refugees Visit Website

General (scope, criteria, time limits)

Under Article 89 Asylum Code, an application can be considered inadmissible on the following grounds:

• Another EU Member State has granted international protection status to the applicant;
• Another EU Member State has accepted responsibility under the Dublin Regulation for the applicant;
• When the First Country of Asylum concept is applied;
• When the Safe Third Country concept is applied;
• The application is a Subsequent Application and no “new essential elements” have been presented;
• A family member has submitted a separate application to the family application without justification for lodging a separate claim.

Unless otherwise provided, the Asylum Service must decide on the admissibility of an application within 30 days.^[1]

Article 91(5) Asylum Code, transposing Article 38(4) of Directive 2013/32/EU (Asylum Procedures Directive), provides that where the third country to which an applicant is meant to be returned does not allow the applicant to enter its territory, his/her application shall be examined on the merits by the Competent Examination Authorities.

The examination of the safe third country concept in practice used to take place under the scope of the fast-track border procedure since 2016. More specifically, up until June 2021 it was applied exclusively to Syrian nationals who fell under the EU Türkiye Statement, meaning those who had entered Greece via the Greek Aegean islands and who were subject to a geographical restriction. Syrians whose geographical limitation was lifted were then channelled to the mainland and were examined under the regular procedure. The situation changed significantly in 2021 following the Joint Ministerial Decision issued on 7 June 2021, designating Türkiye as a safe third country (STC) for asylum applicants coming from Syria, Afghanistan, Somalia, Pakistan and Bangladesh.^[2]

Apart from the numerous concerns that have been repeatedly raised as to whether Türkiye should be considered a “safe third country”,^[3] an additional significant element of the unfeasibility of this new decision is the fact that Türkiye has not been accepting any readmissions from Greece since March 2020.^[4] As a consequence, refugees whose applications have been/are rejected as inadmissible based on the “safe third country” concept end up in a state of legal limbo in Greece, exposed to a direct risk of destitution and detention, without access to an in-merit examination of their application .

The Commissioner for Migration and Home Affairs of the European Commission has reiterated several times the importance of examining the merits of these applications for international protection, in accordance with EU law.^[5] On 7 December 2021, the Commissioner issued a response to a joint open letter by civil society organisations, where she reiterated the Commission’s continued concerns over individuals left in “legal limbo” in Greece.^[6] As she stated, “in line with Article 38(4) of the Asylum Procedures Directive, the Greek authorities should ensure that applicants whose applications have been declared inadmissible under the Joint Ministerial Decision and who are not being admitted to Türkiye should be given access to the in-merits asylum procedure”.^[7]

According to UNHCR’s position and recommendations on the Safe Third Country declaration by Greece:^[8]

‘The absence of a mutually agreed readmission arrangement or delay in the implementation elevates the risk of protracted detention and situations of legal limbo for those concerned who may not be readmitted, increasing human misery and in all likelihood, fuelling further onward movement within the EU. Where cooperation is not mutually agreed to, or required protection safeguards are not in place, an in-merit examination of asylum claims of applicants of those nationality groups should take place without undue delay to avoid legal limbo situations.’

According to a Communication from the European Commission to the Council and the European Parliament, ‘[r]esponding to repeated requests from the Greek authorities and the European Commission regarding the resumption of return operations, Türkiye has stated that no return operation would take place unless the alleged pushbacks along the Turkish-Greek border stop and Greece revokes its decision to consider Türkiye a Safe Third Country’ (24 May 2022).^[9]

Despite the fact that readmissions to Türkiye have been suspended since March 2020, the Asylum Service continues not to apply Article 38(4) of the Procedures Directive to applicants whose application is examined on the admissibility under the safe third country concept vis-à-vis Türkiye. Thus, applicants subject to the Joint Ministerial Decision, whose applications have been rejected as inadmissible, are deprived of access to an in-merits asylum procedure and they face the risk to remain in legal limbo, without access to reception conditions and health care and at risk of detention.

In 2023, a total of 64.212 new asylum applications were registered in Greece, 57,891 of which were first time asylum applications and 6,321 subsequent asylum applications.^[10] Of the total (disaggregated data is not available), close to half (47.5%) were submitted by nationalities impacted by the JMD and specifically 21,8% by Syrian nationals, 14,8% by Afghan nationals, 6,3% by Pakistani nationals and 4,6% by Somali nationals.^[11]

It should be noted that an application for the annulment of the JMD was submitted before the Greek Council of State and its examination was discussed on 11 March 2022.^[12] In a decision issued on 3 February 2023,^[13] the Council of State referred a question to the CJEU for a preliminary ruling on the interpretation of article 38 of 2013/32/EU Directive, since Türkiye has not accepted any readmissions from Greece since March 2020. In particular, the majority opinion of the Council considered that it is not possible to designate a country as a safe third country if the readmission of the applicant to that country does not appear to be possible. This possibility should be assessed both in terms of legal provisions and obligations of the third country to accept readmissions as well as the actual compliance to those legal provisions. Readmissions to Türkiye are not implemented and the competent authority did not adequately explore the possibility of Türkiye changing its stance. Thus, in view of ensuring a quick examination of asylum applications,^[14] the national list established by the JMD should be annulled.

The decision includes two dissenting opinions on whether the non-implementation of returns should be taken into consideration either at the time of issuance of an individual decision on the asylum application assessing whether Türkiye is a safe third country or at the time of executing the decision of return and not before including this country in the national list of safe third countries.

According to the majority opinion: “[…] Article 38(4) [Asylum Procedures Directive] does not provide the possibility of entry or readmission of a foreigner to the third country as a condition for the application of the safe third country concept. However, according to constant CJEU case law, the interpretation of a provision of European Union law shall take into consideration not only its letter but also the context in which it is introduced, as well as the objectives pursued by the measure of which it forms part (see indicatively ECJ, C-232/82, Merck, 17 November 1983, paragraph 18, and CJEU, C-202/18 και C-238/18, Rimšēvičs and ECB v Latvia, 26 March 2019, paragraph 45). In the present case, in view of Article 18 of the Charter (aforementioned paragraph 8), the provisions of [the Asylum Procedures Directive] relating to inadmissible applications for international protection must be interpreted in such a way as to serve the purported objective of the Directive to safeguard rapid examination of applications for international protection insofar as possible (see CJEU, C-556/17 Torubarov, 29 July 2019, paragraph 53). This objective is set out in recital 18 of the Directive […]

Under that reading, Article 38 of the Directive (and corresponding Article 86 [IPA]) must be interpreted as precluding the designation of a third country as safe where it is not established that entry or readmission of the applicant protection thereto will not be feasible. A contrary reading would merely prolong the duration of examination of the submitted application for international protection and uncertainty on the applicant as regards the status of their stay in the country where they submitted an application, without excluding the risk of their refoulement to a country where they risk facing persecution (mutatis mutandis European Commission on Human Rights, A.H. [Harabi] v. the Netherlands, App No 10798/84, 5 March 1986) and the possibility of disruption in international relations of states. The view that the possibility of entry or readmission of a foreign applicant for protection to a third country constitutes a condition for the designation of a third country as safe has, besides, been set out in soft law texts of the Council of Europe (Committee of Ministers Recommendation R(97)22 and Guidelines of 1 July 2009) and has been supported by part of the international law doctrine (in particular Stephen H. Legomsky, Secondary Refugee Movements and the Return of Asylum Seekers to Third Countries: The Meaning of Effective Protection, International Journal of Refugee Law, 2003, p. 567 et seq.), while it has been adopted by courts of other European Union Member States (see Dutch Council of State, decision 201609584/1/V3 of 13 December 2017). Furthermore, the assessment of fulfilment of the possibility of entry or readmission of the foreigner to the safe third country encompasses an examination of both the legal framework in said country (i.e. potential undertaking of a related legal obligation on the part of the third country) and compliance of the third country with its undertaken legal obligations in practice. The above observations lead to the conclusion that, where a Member State establishes a national list of generally safe third countries by making use of the discretion afforded by Article 38(2) of the Directive, it may not, for reasons of rapid conclusion of the examination of applications for international protection as mentioned above, make a regulatory designation of a third country as safe where the fulfilment of the aforementioned condition – the possibility of entry or readmission to said country – is not assessed on both its aforementioned limbs.[…]

[para 41] However, as regards its second limb, relating to Türkiye’s compliance with its legal obligations in practice, the same condition is not fulfilled since readmission to Türkiye is not being carried out for applicants for international protection whose applications have been dismissed as inadmissible on “safe third country” grounds. On the contrary, as expressly stated in the service note of the Procedures and Training Section of the Asylum Service of 3 December 2021 (p. 8), which accompanies the recommendation of the Director of the Asylum Service no 438958/21 of 7 December 2021 following which the contested Joint Ministerial Decision was issued… “From March 2020 to present [therefore for a period exceeding twenty months] returns from Greece to Türkiye have frozen”, without any distinction as to the legal basis on which returns are ordered (international agreements or EU-Turkey Statement, as stated above). It also cannot be accepted, as submitted by the State… that it is a temporary “and more or less justified non-implementation [of the statement of 18 March 2016 due to the circumstances]” (“Türkiye temporarily, due to the COVID pandemic, a global and undeniable event), does not accept readmissions over the last period”) is not supported by the elements of the file […]”.

Given that reasonable doubts arose as to the meaning of Article 38 of the Directive, the Court postponed its final judgement and formulated preliminary questions to the CJEU. The Court requested clarification as to whether Article 38 of the Directive should be interpreted as precluding national (regulatory) provisions, which characterises a third country as generally safe for certain categories of applicants for international protection and that country has undertaken the legal obligation to readmit those categories of applicants to its territory, despite the fact that the country that is considered as safe third country has refused readmissions for a period of over twenty months; or whether the readmission to the third country is a cumulative condition for the issuance of the national (regulatory) act, according to which a third country is characterised as generally safe for certain categories of applicants for international protection, or for the issuance of the individual act, according to which a specific application for international protection is rejected as inadmissible on the “safe third country” ground; or, finally, whether the readmission to the “safe third country” should only be determined at the time of the decision’s execution, when the decision to reject the application for international protection is based on the “safe third country” ground.

On 14 March 2024, the preliminary questions referred by the Plenary of the Council of State in its judgment No 177/2023 concerning the inclusion of Türkiyein the national list of “safe third countries” was discussed in an oral hearing before the CJEU in Luxembourg,^[15] while the opinion of the advocate general is expected to be issued in June 2024.

The JMD 42799/3-6-2021 declaring Türkiye as a safe third country was amended by Decision No. 458568/2021 (FEK 5949/16-12-2021) to include Albania and Northern Macedonia as safe third countries for all nationals entering Greece from the countries listed.^[16]

In December 2022, JMD 734214/6-12-2022 was issued, confirming the continuity and full validity of the amended JMD 42799/3-6-2021.^[17] Respectively, in December 2023, JMD 538595/12-12-2023 (FEK 7063/15-12-2023) was issued, following the 485728/31-10-2023 “Recommendation regarding the establishment of the national list of safe third countries according to art. 91 Law 4939/2022” of the Director of the Asylum Service, repeating the content of the amended JMD 42799/3-6-2021.^[18]

In 2023, 3.454 asylum applications were found inadmissible at first instance based on the “safe third country” concept.^[19] Additionally, 1.319 asylum applications were found inadmissible at second instance, including 1.237 in which Türkiye was the “safe third country”, 57 where it was North Macedonia and 25 where it was Albania.^[20]

Personal interview

The conduct of an interview on the admissibility procedure varies depending on the admissibility ground examined.

According to Article 94(2) Asylum Code, as a rule, no interview should be held during the preliminary examination of a subsequent application. The examination of a subsequent application takes place only through written submissions and submitted documents together with the elements of the first asylum application. The interview is conducted only if the subsequent application for asylum is deemed admissible (see section on Subsequent Applications). As regards the process for Dublin cases, see section on Dublin.

Personal interviews in cases examined under the “safe third country” concept focus on the circumstances that the applicants face in Türkiye and specifically on:

• whether they have applied for international protection in Türkiye and;
• if not, which reasons prevented them from doing so;
• whether they have family and friends in Türkiye;
• how long they remained in Türkiye;
• if they had access to work, housing, education and health care;
• and in general, if Türkiye is a safe country for them.

Since 1 January 2020, it is possible for the admissibility interview to be carried out by personnel of EUAA or, in particularly urgent circumstances, trained personnel of the Hellenic Police or the Armed Forces. The training needs to be in international human rights law, EU Law on Asylum and the procedures for conducting interviews.^[21] Such personnel are not allowed to wear military or law enforcement uniforms during interviews.^[22] However, EUAA caseworkers do not draft Opinions on cases where the JMD 42799/2021 designating Türkiye as a safe third country applies, as it falls outside their competence.^[23] Instead, EUAA caseworkers, following the interview, can send to Asylum Service caseworkers an annex with notes and comments on crucial issues to be taken into consideration.[24]

In 2023, in Samos, Kos, Lesvos and Chios, admissibility interviews were conducted before an adequate vulnerability assessment had been completed.^[25] Furthermore, in general, no reasonable time has been provided before the admissibility interview for applicants to access information on asylum procedures, legal aid, prepare for the interview and collect and submit significant documents/evidence in support of their application for international protection.[26]

Even if indications of vulnerability arose during an asylum interview, caseworkers did not refer applicants to psychosocial assessments and/or further medical examination at a general hospital, although this is provided for in art. 77 and 41 of Asylum Code.[27]

In Chios CCAC (Vial camp), the Medical Unit has no doctor since March 2021. In 2023, periodically, the doctor of Leros CCAC Medical Unit was visiting Chios CCAC only to sign pre-completed – by generally unauthorized personnel – vulnerability assessment documents and medical cards with references to apparent vulnerabilities, without carrying out himself a substantive assessment of the medical condition of the asylum applicants.^[28]

According to internal SOPs, circulated within the Asylum Service in the autumn of 2021, asylum seekers from the 5 nationalities affected by the JMD (Syria, Afghanistan, Somalia, Pakistan and Bangladesh), who have entered Greece from Türkiye and have stayed in Greece for a year or more must be considered as not having a special link/connection with the third country (i.e., Türkiye) or that in any case the special link/connection has ceased to exist (See Safe third country).

In Kos, from approximately August 2023 to mid-December 2023, probably due to backlog connected to increased new arrivals and personnel shortages, RAO was conducting admissibility interviews only for Syrian nationals.^[29] Moreover, during the same period, it has been observed that admissibility interviews, in several cases, were limited to superficially examining the criterion of connection of Syrian applicants with Türkiye. Instead, safety or other criteria had not been examined and/or taken into consideration for the decision (i.e., well-founded fear of deportation to country of origin, racist attacks, detention, lack of legal documentation, non-access to healthcare, labour market and education, etc.).

Moreover, it has been observed that stateless persons who had one of the 5 countries of the JMD on STC as countries of their habitual residence were included in the admissibility procedure.[30] This practice applied despite the fact that this category of asylum seekers (stateless persons with one of the 5 countries of JMD as countries of habitual residence) is not explicitly mentioned in the relevant JMD on STC and Turkiye. Within this context, Palestinians with last habitual residence in Syria were examined under the admissibility procedure.

In February 2023, Kos RAO found admissible the asylum application of a stateless single woman of Palestinian origin with last habitual residence in Syria, taking into account “(a) that the applicant remained in Turkey for more than one year, yet without knowing the Turkish language and without having established social, professional or cultural ties with Turkey, (b) that she does not have a family or other support network in Turkey; (c) that she left Turkey at the end of 2022 and remains in Greece throughout this period, the Service concludes that her connection with Turkey cannot be considered sufficient.^[31]

On 10 February 2023, the 16^th Independent Appeals Committee annulled the first instance negative decision of Lesvos RAO that considered inadmissible the asylum application of a Somali single woman who survived a shipwreck on 6 October 2022 off Lesvos island, where 16 asylum seeking women  died.^[32] The applicant had to undergo an admissibility interview already on 17 October 2022, only 10 days after the deadly shipwreck, while her vulnerability assessment had not been concluded, nor had it been explored during the interview. The shipwreck was never mentioned by the caseworker, nor was it mentioned in the negative decision that was issued two days after the interview. On appeal, the 16^th Appeals Committee, annulled the decision of Lesvos RAO, as it considered that Türkiye is not a safe third country for the Somali single woman and summoned the applicant to an oral hearing on 7 March 2023 to examine her application on the merits.

Based on legal aid organizations’ observations, including GCR, in practice, the Asylum Service did not issue nor notify applicants of their admissibility decisions. As a result, many applicants received an invitation to a personal interview for the in-merits assessment of their asylum claim before RAOs without prior information on the admissibility decision and the next step of the procedure, thus not being able to prepare for the interview. On the other hand, in Lesvos, Kos and Chios, applicants from Syria and Afghanistan who had an admissibility interview and their applications were found admissible did not have an in merits interview; instead, their asylum applications were examined on the basis of their administrative file and, in general, were accepted, without undergoing an asylum interview on the merits. In practice, the Asylum Service notified applicants directly of their positive decisions with reference to their admissibility decisions.

In 2023, the issue of the use of outdated sources in a number of decisions for cases especially concerning the examination of the safe third country concept vis-a-vis Türkiye still remains. For instance, the decisions refer inter alia to the 2019 and 2020 updates of the AIDA country report on Türkiye, to other reports published in 2017 and 2018, and to letters sent by the Permanent Delegation of Türkiye to the European Commission and by the European Commission to the Greek General Secretary of Migration Policy in April and May 2016 in the context of the EU-Turkey Statement.^[33]

Appeal

According to the Asylum Code, the deadlines for appealing an inadmissibility decision, the automatic suspensive effect of appeals and the format of the Committee examining them depend on the inadmissibility ground invoked in the first instance decision under the regular procedure:^[34]

The Appeals Committee must decide on the appeal within 20 days, as opposed to 30 days in the regular procedure.^[35]

Appeals Committees do not apply Art. 38(4) of the Procedures Directive with regard to applications having been rejected as inadmissible on the basis of the safe third Country concept vis-à-vis Türkiye, despite the fact that readmissions to Türkiye have been suspended since March 2020. It is only in a limited number of cases that the Appeals Committees have proceeded to an in-merits examination of the application, invoking inter alia Article 38(4) of the Procedures Directive when taking into consideration the suspension of readmissions to Türkiye.^[36]

In February 2023, the 10^th Appeals Committee considered that the Asylum Service unlawfully rejected the asylum application of a single Somali woman as inadmissible on the ground of the existence of a safe third country, taking into account inter alia the suspension of readmissions to Türkiye.^[37] Specifically, the Committee in its decision held that: “Because information indicates that already from March 2020 Turkey does not accept the return of migrants/refugees who entered Greece irregularly from its territory in accordance with the EU-Turkey Joint Declaration of 18 March 2016 (and the bilateral Readmission Protocol between Greece and Turkey). For this refusal of returns, the Turkish authorities invoke movement restrictions due to the Covid-19 pandemic. A recent European Commission report notes that “in response to repeated requests from the Greek authorities and the European Commission, regarding the resumption of return operations, Turkey has stated that no return operation will be carried out unless the alleged pushbacks along the Turkish-Greek border stop and Greece revokes its decision to consider Turkey as a safe third country”. Finally, according to the ECRE’s July 2022 report, the implementation of the EU-Turkey readmission agreement continued to remain frozen during 2021 and therefore no readmissions to Turkey took place in 2021. [,,,] Since, in the light of the foregoing, the Committee takes note of the fact that, since the beginning of the year 2020, Turkey does not accept readmissions. Moreover, despite the approximately four months – staying of the applicant in Turkey and the circumstances that she claims to have encountered during her stay, since, according to her, she was hiding from the authorities, the Committee takes into account the applicant’s gender, that, during her stay in Türkiye, she did not develop a life relationship, as well as the fact that the applicant lacks a support network in Turkey. In light of these facts, in view of and the requirement of cumulative fulfilment of the conditions of Article 91 of the [Asylum] Code, the Commission considers that in the present case the conditions laid down by that provision are not met in order for Turkey to be considered a safe country for the applicant.”

In 2023, Appeals Committees continued to highlight that women and girls are vulnerable to sexual and labour exploitation in Türkiye. In February 2023, the 16^th Appeals Committee accepted the appeal of a Somali single woman and overturned the first instance negative decision of the RAO that had rejected her asylum application as inadmissible based on the safe third country concept.^[38] The Appeals Committee noted that: “taking into account in particular: a) the applicant’s age (she is in her 37th year of age according to her reported date of birth, (b) that she has not attended school and is therefore perceived to be particularly vulnerable, given that she has never before been outside her country of origin; c) that she is not accompanied by a relative or another adult person capable of providing effective protection and it does not appear that there is a family or friendship support network for her (the applicant) in Turkey, the Commission suspects that due to the applicant’s above-mentioned situation, there is a risk of serious harm to her in the event of her readmission to Turkey, where women are vulnerable to sexual and racial violence and the labour market also presents high risks of exploitation for single women, particularly if they are illiterate. In the light of the foregoing and in accordance with what has been set out in detail above, the Commission considers that in the applicant’s case the legally required connection is not established, on the basis of which it would be reasonable for her to travel to Turkey and, consequently, the criterion in point (f) of paragraph (f) does not apply in her case.”

In February 2023, the 21^st Appeals Committee, accepted the appeal of an Afghan family, whose application had been found inadmissible at first instance based on the safe third country concept.^[39] The Appeals Committee took into consideration that the applicants: “(i) despite having stayed in Turkey for a period of approximately five (5) months, they were only able to work for a few days and without receiving any payment; (ii) they do not have a family or friends support network in Turkey, which could assist them on their return; and (i) although they have attempted to apply for international protection, the Turkish authorities have refused to receive the application, the Commission considers that, in the applicants’ case, the legally required link is not established on the basis of which it would be reasonable for them to go to Turkey […] In view of required cumulative fulfilment of each of the criteria laid down in the law, the Turkey cannot be regarded as a safe third country for the applicants.”

Legal assistance

Legal Assistance in the admissibility procedure does not differ from the one granted for the regular procedure (see section on Regular Procedure: Legal Assistance). Thus, asylum seekers do not have access to free legal assistance during the admissibility procedures at first instance but only at second instance.^[40] The lack of legal assistance has proven particularly problematic, especially for cases falling under the JMD designating Türkiye as a safe third country. While legal aid services are provided at second instance, meaning the submission of an appeal against the first instance negative decision on admissibility, the ten-day deadline for the submission of the appeal following the notice of an inadmissibility decision is not, in any case, adequate for asylum applicants, nor for the registry lawyers to be properly prepared for the appeal procedure and prepare an effective representation before the Appeals Authority.

Suspension of returns for beneficiaries of protection in another Member State

According to Dublin III Regulation, a Member State may send a take back request (Articles 18(1b-d) and 20(5)) asking another Member State to take responsibility for an applicant who applied for international protection within the reporting country but had already applied in the first Member State or because the other Member State previously accepted responsibility through a take charge request.

Data on outgoing “take back” requests and relevant positive decisions per Member State have not been provided by the MoMA, even though GCR has requested it. Instead, following the latest such request sent by GCR in January 2024, the MoMA replied by referring GCR to the Ministry’s website “and in particular at the link https://migration.gov.gr/statistika/ [where] the monthly newsletters are published, alongside relevant annexes, which include summary and detailed statistical data on the work of the First Reception Service, the Asylum Service and the Appeals Authority […]”. Yet a closer look at the public sources referred by the MoMA highlights that the specific data is not available.

^[1] Article 88(2) Asylum Code. Different deadlines are provided, e.g, for subsequent applications; when the safe third country concept is examined under the fast-track border procedure, etc.

^[2] Joint Ministerial Decision (JMD) 42799/2021, Gov. Gazette 2425/Β/7-6-2021, available in Greek at: https://tinyurl.com/2z8588nb .

^[3] Indicatively see: GCR, Greece deems Turkey ‘safe’, but refugees are not: The substantive examination of asylum applications is the only safe solution for refugees, 14 June 2021, available at: https://bit.ly/3E3qgCe.

^[4] For instance see: MoMA, New request from Greece for the return of 1.908 illegal economic migrants to Türkiye, 28 July 2021, available at: https://bit.ly/3rl5bhy; European Commission, Commission Staff Working Document: Türkiye 2020 Report, 6 October 2020, https://bit.ly/3xgt4aK, p. 48.

^[5] Answers given by Ms Johansson on behalf of the European Commission, EN P-000604/2021, 1 June 2021, available at: https://bit.ly/47Zw2Te; E-003875/2021, 18 October 2021, available at: https://bit.ly/4ak50In; E-004131/2021, 21 December 2021, available at: https://bit.ly/3RtSNJu.

^[6] Joint CSO Open Letter, Denying food: instead of receiving protection people go hungry on EU soil, 26 October 2021, available at: https://bit.ly/3uyeEEb.

^[7] Ylva Johansson, Response to the 26 October 2021 Joint CSO Open Letter, Ares S(2021)8048555, 7 December 2021, available at: https://bit.ly/3Jyt7V4.

^[8] UNHCR, UNHCR’s Position and Recommendations on the Safe Third Country Declaration by Greece, 2 August 2021, available at: https://bit.ly/3EuyKm1.

^[9] European Commission, Communication from the Commission to the Council and the European Parliament –     sixth annual report on the Facility for Refugees in Turkey, 24 May 2022, available at: https://bit.ly/417mB1B, p.3.

[10] MoMA, Statistics, Consolidated Reports – Overview: December 2023 – International Protection | Appendix A, available at: https://tinyurl.com/yc2stzh7, table 8c.

[11] Ibid. table 8d.

^[12] GCR, “Εκδικάστηκε ενώπιον του ΣτΕ η αίτηση ακύρωσης της Απόφασης με την οποία η Τουρκία χαρακτηρίστηκε ασφαλής τρίτη χώρα”, 15 March 2022, available in Greek at: https://bit.ly/365HUJ9.

[13] Plenary of the Council of State, Decision no 177/2023, 3 February 2022, available in Greek at: https://bit.ly/3Gs6GSc.

^[14] As provided by Article 18 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights and Article 38 of EU Directive 2013/32/EU.

[15] GCR & RSA, Hearing before the Court of Justice of the European Union on Thursday 14 March on the preliminary questions of the Greek Council of State regarding Turkey as a “safe third country“, 13 March 2024, available at: https://tinyurl.com/8jwbaccz. See also ECRE, Newsletter, “Greece: […] ― CJEU Hearing on Designation of Türkiye as a “Safe Third Country”, 15 March 2024, available at: https://tinyurl.com/5n8b2etb

[16] FEK 5949/16-12-2021, available in Greek at: https://tinyurl.com/5dauc7e8. 

[17] JMD 734214/6-12-2022, available in Greek at: https://bit.ly/3TMbGY3.

[18] JMD 538595/12-12-2023 (FEK 7063/15-12-2023), available in Greek at: https://tinyurl.com/2nntzpw6.

[19] MoMA, Statistics, Consolidated Reports – Overview: December 2023 – International Protection | Appendix A, available at: https://tinyurl.com/yc2stzh7, table 9a.

^[20] Ibid., table 9b.

^[21] Article 82(1) Asylum Code.

^[22] Article 82(12) (c) Asylum Code.

^[23] Information provided by the EUAA, 28 February 2023.

[24] In response to an information request submitted by ECRE for the year 2023, the EUAA answered on 26 February 2024 that “[t]he number of concluding remarks issued by EUAA decreased to 776 in 2023, a significant drop compared to 2022 (5,071). This is due to the fact that, following the June 2021 Joint Ministerial Decision designating Turkey as a safe third country for applicants from five of the most common countries of origin in Greece, the drafting of concluding remarks by EUAA caseworkers is no longer required for a large share of cases, that is those examined on admissibility”.

^[25] Information obtained during Legal Aid Working Group meetings, 2023.

[26] Ibid.

[27] Ibid.

^[28] Information shared by Chios UNCHR Field Office.

^[29] Information obtained during Kos Legal Aid Working Group meeting of 13 December 2023.

[30] Information shared by different actors, including GCR, during Legal Aid Working Group meetings, 2023.

^[31] Decision 97412/2023 issued by Kos RAO (ΠΓΑ Κω 97412/2013). Case represented before Kos RAO by Equal Rights Beyond Borders. Summary of the decision available in Greek in GCR/HIAS/RSA, Greek Asylum Case Law Report Issue 1/2023, available at: https://tinyurl.com/2meam8kv.

^[32] See a relative newsarticle in: Ertnews, Tragedy with 17 dead in a shipwreck in Lesvos – Shocking videos from the shipwreck in Kythera, 6 October 2022, available in Greek at: https://tinyurl.com/4npb6je3.

[33] As evidenced by decisions received by GCR’s beneficiaries. See also PROASYL & RSA, The Concept of “Safe Third Country”: Legal Standards & Implementation in the Greek Asylum System, February 2024, available at: https://tinyurl.com/rh6cte8t, p. 10.

^[34] Article 97(d). It should be noted that the deadline for appealing against decisions issued under the provision of Article 95 Asylum Code (border procedure) is 10 days.

^[35] Article 101 (d) L4636/2019, as amended by Article 25 (d) L4686/2020.

^[36] Indicatively: 21st Appeals Committee, Decision 115795/2022, issued 28 February 2022, 10th Appeals Committee, Decision 224433/2022, issued 20 April 2022, 3rd Appeals Committee, Decision 345521/2022, issued 16 June 2022.

[37] Case represented before the Appeals Committee by a lawyer from the Registry, 10η ΕπΠροσ 83008/2023.

^[38] Case represented by GCR before the Appeals Committee. Description of the decision available in Greek in GCR, HIAS, RSA et al, Greek Asylum Case Law Report, Issue 1/2023, p. 9, 16η ΕπΠροσ 85916/2023, available at: https://tinyurl.com/2meam8kv. 

[39] Case represented by GCR before the Appeals Committee. Description of the decision available in Greek in GCR, HIAS, RSA et al, Greek Asylum Case Law Report, Issue 1/2023, p. 9, 21η ΕπΠροσ 87590/2023, available at: https://tinyurl.com/2meam8kv.

^[40] Art. 76 of the Asylum Code.