The survivor of a brutal pushback in Greece was forced to take action at UN level, in a display of the impossibly high standard of evidence required in European courts to prevent victims of pushbacks from accessing justice.
A Hazara teenager’s flight from Afghanistan in 2018 during an uptick in Taliban violence against the minority, ended in a rubber dinghy ride from Turkey to Samos, a Greek island.
The 13 year-old had unsuccessfully attempted to obtain international protection in Iran, Turkey, and later in a refugee camp in Samos upon arriving in 2020, now aged 15. His requests to initiate an asylum procedure were ignored, and he was promptly hoisted onto a coast guard boat to Turkey.
The boy was handcuffed to another young traveller, and both had their phones and money stolen by Greek coast guards.
Despite providing photos, videos, locations shared in real time, Turkish Coast Guard and Frontex database records, the European Court of human rights (ECHR) rejected the case for lack of evidence in 2025.
Now granted refugee status in Europe, the young man tried overcoming the maze of obstacles which have so far prevented anyone from successfully pursued legal action against a pushback on Friday (30 October), submitting a claim to the UN’s Human Rights Committee against Greece.
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The case represents an extraordinary mishandling of basic human rights, since pushback cases usually fail to see justice because there is usually no evidence of their arrival on European soil.
Yet here, the Afghan boy had made it all the way to the camp where they met asylum seekers that were known to them.
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