Detention orders: 2022 6573 7081 16977 Return (Return Directive) Deportation (derogation from Return Directive) Asylum (Reception Conditions Directive) Source: Ministry of Citizen Protection, Reply to parliamentary question, 13 March 2023 Specifically, detention orders rose by 8% in return procedures, and by 55% in deportation procedures conducted by way of derogation from the Return Directive. A striking 697% increase was recorded in asylum detention orders. The Hellenic Police took a total of 33,441 removal decisions, of which 26,338 return decisions under the Return Directive and 7,103 deportation decisions on the Eastern Aegean islands by way of derogation from the Directive. The Police clarifies that all new arrivals are channelled into screening (“reception and identification”) procedures, following which persons who do not fall under the asylum procedure “are referred to the competent police Authority for channelling into deportation, return or readmission procedures”. Yet, this position is called into question by the data pointing to 7,103 deportation decisions taken in 2022 even though the same authority concedes that “almost all entrants in our country make an asylum application during the reception and identification procedure”. 1 Furthermore, official statistics confirm that Greece applies pre-removal detention systematically and not as a last resort measure in removal procedures. Deprivation of liberty is almost an automatic adjunct of deportation decisions taken in derogation from the Return Directive, since 99.7% of deportation orders were accompanied by detention. Conversely, the rate of return decisions carrying detention was 64.5%: 1 Directorate of the Hellenic Police, Reply to parliamentary question, 7017/4/25899-γ΄, 16 March 2022, available at: https://bit.ly/3LilM02. 2 RSA POLICY NOTE │ 2023