Despite the numerous protests voiced by human rights organizations and the warnings of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the European Union has started deporting refugees from Greece to Turkey, the New York Times reads.
The return of refugees is taking place under the latest EU-brokered deal with Ankara, under which each migrant who has illegally entered Europe will be taken back to Turkey, while the EU will relocate one legal refugee to one of its member states.
The plan is abundant with serious problems related to international laws and human rights. According to the UNHCR, it does not provide sufficient guarantees regarding people's protection.
In line with international, European and Turkish law, refugees cannot be forcibly returned to an unsafe country.
Authorities on the Greek island of Chios said several hundred people pushed their way out of an overcrowded detention camp and staged a peaceful protest in the island's main town, chanting "freedom, freedom" and "Turkey no." The rally followed overnight clashes between Syrian and Afghan detainees that left five people injured, the renowned paper reads.
In Geneva, Switzerland, UNHCR, urged Greece and Turkey to provide further safeguards for asylum seekers before the returns begin, stating that conditions were worsening by the day for more than 4,000 people being held in detention on Greek islands.
And rights group Amnesty International, which has strongly opposed the EU-Turkey agreement from the start, said in a report that it had evidence of Turkish authorities rounding up Syrians and sending them back across the border to their conflict-torn country.
The group said Turkey has been expelling around 100 men, women and children nearly daily since mid-January.
"EU leaders have willfully ignored the simplest of facts: Turkey is not a safe country for Syrian refugees," Amnesty's Europe and Central Asia Director John Dalhuisen said, the New York Times notes.