When Securitisation Trumps Rights: The Unlawful and Arbitrary Detention of Asylum Seekers on Samos

[Emma Neuber is a member of the Samos-based NGO I Have Rights and an LLM candidate at the Irish Centre for Human Rights, University of Galway]

I was running for freedom and came to a prison.

An asylum seeker from the Closed Controlled Access Centre on Samos, Greece

Detention has become a prevalent response to irregular migration, reflecting the ever-increasing securitisation of migration policies. The detention of migrants reveals a troubling perception: those leaving their countries to search for protection elsewhere are increasingly seen as a security threat. In the efforts to solve this perceived problem, all means, including severe violations of the rights of migrants, seem to be justified. The treatment of asylum seekers in Samos serves as a pertinent example of this phenomenon. This post shows how a regime of de facto detention systematically violates the asylum seekers’ right to liberty, as enshrined in Article 5 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and Article 9 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). 

Samos is a small, picturesque Greek island in the Aegean Sea located less than 3 kilometres from the Turkish coast. For many migrants, it marks their first entry point into the European Union and the place where they must seek asylum. Due to the high number of migrants who have been arriving on the island for years, Samos was designated as one of the five Greek hotspots in 2015. As a result, it houses a first reception centre, the Closed Controlled Access Centre (CCAC), where almost all asylum seekers reside for their supposedly swift identification, registration and asylum procedure. Despite promises by EU Commissioner Johansson before the CCAC’s opening, that these facilities ‘will not be closed, they will be humane’, the reality has proven to be quite different. 

Funded by the EU with 43 million euros, the CCAC opened in September 2021 as the first of its kind. It was built in an isolated part of the island, seven kilometres away from the nearest town. With barbed-wire fences, a constant police presence, private security personnel, multiple checkpoints outside and within the CCAC consisting of turnstiles, magnetic gates, x-ray machines, two-factor identification procedures, and extensive surveillance via CCTV cameras and AI-based systems, the CCAC bears a far greater resemblance to a prison than to a reception centre intended to be suitable for those who may have suffered traumatic experiences in their countries of origin and during their migratory journeys. 

The prison-like nature of the CCAC is further compounded by the fact that asylum seekers are subject to varying degrees of restrictions on their movements at different stages of the asylum procedure. Upon arrival, they are de facto detained in a designated sub-section of the CCAC, the so-called ‘quarantine zone’. Subsequently, they automatically receive a 25-day restriction of freedom order, prohibiting them from leaving the CCAC until they have been fully registered. Even after their registration, their movement remains severely restricted due to the remote location of the CCAC, intense surveillance measures, and an imposed curfew. I Have Rights, a Samos-based non-profit law clinic, has convincingly argued that all three of these regimes amount to de facto detention, violating the asylum seekers’ right to liberty. 

Let’s take a closer look at the most severe restriction of movement, the confinement in the so-called ‘quarantine zone’. This practice has been recently reintroduced after having been discontinued for some years after the Covid-19 pandemic. However, since September 2024, all asylum seekers newly arriving in the CCAC have again been subjected to a regime of unlawful and arbitrary de facto detention. 

To determine whether the confinement in the ‘quarantine zone’ constitutes a deprivation of liberty, it is essential to distinguish the practice from a mere restriction of the freedom of movement. In this regard, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has held in Amuur v. France, that the distinction is a matter of its ‘degree or intensity’ [§42]. The ‘quarantine zone’ is a sub-section of the CCAC which consists of 37 containers of 25 square meters each. For periods ranging from two to 22 days, new arrivals are unable to leave the designated sector, let alone the CCAC in general. Given the intensity of these restrictions, it is evident that they reach the threshold of a deprivation of liberty. This conclusion is further supported by the ECtHR’s rulings, inter alia, in J.R. and Others v. Greece and Khlaifia and Others v. Italy, which found in the case of other ‘hotspot’ islands that the inability to leave a reception facility amounted to a deprivation of liberty. 

However, a deprivation of liberty does not necessarily constitute a violation of the right to liberty if it is lawful and not arbitrary. In this regard, Article 5(1) ECHR and Art 9(1) ICCPR establish that detention must have a legal basis. In 2020, a similar confinement regime was based on an Emergency Decree by the Greek government aimed at preventing the potential spread of the coronavirus in reception facilities. However, it remains unclear whether the current deprivation of liberty is based on the same decree. This uncertainty is exacerbated by the fact that detainees are neither provided with a formal detention order nor are they informed of the reason for their detention. This alleged lack of a legal basis renders the de facto detention unlawful.

Even if the de facto detention had a domestic legal basis, it would still be arbitrary. While the ‘prevention of the spreading of infectious diseases’ is a permissible ground for detention under Article 5(1)(e) ECHR, reportedly, no actual Covid-tests are carried out. This raises doubts whether a genuine medical reason for the detention exists. The lack of a discernable purpose of detention is further demonstrated by its unpredictable duration, which varies significantly from case to case. 

Furthermore, the de facto detention regime is applied as a blanket policy to all newly arrived asylum seekers. This violates the requirement of an individualised assessment of the proportionality, necessity, and reasonableness, and the consideration of less coercive means, as emphasised by the Human Rights Committee in its General Comment No 35. As no vulnerability assessments are carried out prior to the de facto detention, vulnerable asylum seekers, such as survivors of human trafficking, torture or other forms of serious violence are not exempted from detention. This contradicts the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention’s clear stance that such detention ‘must not take place.’

Moreover, the de facto detention does not follow fundamental procedural safeguards as required by international law. Asylum seekers report that they are not provided with clear information on the reasons and duration of their placement in the quarantine zone. Moreover, without formal detention orders and no access to effective remedies, they are unable to legally challenge their deprivation of liberty while being detained in the ‘quarantine zone.’ Furthermore, their detention is not promptly reviewed by a competent court as required, inter alia, under Article 5(4) ECHR and Article 9(4) ICCPR. 

However, it is not only the procedures related to the de facto detention that make it arbitrary but also the conditions in the ‘quarantine zone’. In its above-mentioned General Comment No. 35, the Human Rights Committee reiterated that detention conditions must be appropriate to the purpose of detention. In that regard, the ECtHR reminded us in Saadi v. UK that the detention of asylum seekers is not a criminal detention but one of those who fled their country, which calls for appropriate conditions. However, the appalling, sub-standard detention conditions in the CCAC contradict this principle and may even amount to a violation of the prohibition of inhumane and degrading treatment, in violation of, inter alia, Article 3 ECHR, 7 ICCPR and the UN Convention against Torture, Inhumane and Degrading Treatment. 

Reports from Samos show that the containers in the ‘quarantine zone’ are severely overcrowded. Reportedly, eight to 40 people share one 25 square meter container, leaving each individual with approximately 3 to 0.6 square metres of personal space. This falls severely below the standard of 4 square metres per person, required by the Committee on the Prevention of Torture’s standards. The severe overcrowding and a lack of beds, mattresses and blankets also force people to sleep on the floor, sometimes only on a piece of cardboard. The Border Violence Monitoring Network even reported on a case of a pregnant woman being forced to sleep on the floor. Moreover, no separate containers are provided for families, women, or minors, raising significant safety concerns. 

Furthermore, the hygienic conditions are appalling. People have no access to showers and laundry facilities. Their access to sanitary facilities is insufficient with facilities being in poor conditions, sometimes lacking doors which raises further privacy and safety concerns. There are regular water cuts and if water is available, it is cold. On top of that, the supply of hygiene products is insufficient, if not completely absent, leaving newly arrived asylum seekers with limited access to sanitary facilities and without any hygiene products for up to 3 weeks after their arrival. 

Taken together, these factors illustrate that asylum seekers on Samos are systematically subjected to a regime of arbitrary and unlawful de facto detention that severely violates their right to liberty. They are furthermore at the immediate risk of inhumane and degrading treatment, further undermining their fundamental rights. 

One can only imagine the impact this must have on the mental health of those newly arrived, in particular of those who we might call vulnerable, which includes, inter alia, minors, the elderly, and survivors of torture or human trafficking. All in all, it shows the human dimension of the ever-expanding securitisation of migration to the detriment of migrants’ human rights. It must also raise the question of how to counter the compromise of human rights for political ends if we are truly committed to the universality and inalienability of human rights.