1. INTRODUCTION This report is a follow up to GCR’s 2023 Report on pushback cases titled “At Europe’s Borders: Between Impunity and Criminalization”.1 The aim of this series of reports is to contribute to an existing body of extensive documentation of the Greek state’s illegal pushbacks practice and shed light on this systematic state policy, by providing detailed descriptions of pushωback cases legally represented by GCR before the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and / or the Greek Public Prosecutor. While the GCR’s 2023 Report recounted pushback cases brought before the ECtHR between March 2022 and October 2022, this report recounts pushback cases in the Evros border region that occurred in 2023 and brought before the ECtHR between May 2023 and February 2024. The report also presents essential judicial developments that occurred in 2023 and the first half of 2024 on earlier pushback cases, all legally represented by GCR and filed with the ECtHR. The report first presents the latest updates on the situation of human rights at the EU’s external land and sea borders as documented by international and national human rights bodies and institutions and independent authorities, in line with civil society organizations’ and international media’s reports (see Chapter 2 below). Within this context, we share updates on the Deadly Pylos Shipwreck case and set the broader context with regards to the treatment of the newly arrived asylum seekers in the Evros border region. Next, an in-depth analysis of the victims’ testimonies on 12 pushback operations in the Evros region throughout 2023 demonstrates that said illegal practices are continuing as a comprehensive, systematic, and meticulously planned migration and border policy of the Greek state, revealing a modus operandi of the Greek authorities, consistent with numerous credible reports from UN, European and national institutions, documenting the same pattern: informal arrest, arbitrary and incommunicado detention, illegal confiscation of personal belongings, degrading strip search, violent transfer to the Evros riverbank and illegal expulsion to Türkiye. Additionally, the recent judicial developments of three cases regarding pushbacks that occurred between 2013 and 2021, in conjunction with official statistical data on the progress of investigations into pushback cases in the country, highlight the systemic issue of ineffective criminal investigations into pushbacks and rights violations in Greece, that contribute to an environment of impunity, as the cycle of ill-treatment of people in need of international protection at the EU external borders remains unchallenged. 1 GCR’s 2023 Report recounted pushback cases brought before the ECtHR between March 2022 and October 2022: GCR, At Europe’s Borders: Between Impunity and Criminalization, March 2023, available [in English and Greek] at: https://www.gcr.gr/en/ekdoseis-media/reports/item/2110-at-europe-s-borders-between-impunity-and-criminalization 4 AT EUROPE’S BORDERS: PUSHBACKS CONTINUE AS IMPUNITY PERSISTS