Apart from the numerous concerns that have been repeatedly raised as to whether Türkiye can be considered a “safe third country”,528 an additional significant element of the unfeasibility of this decision has been the fact that Türkiye has not been accepting any readmissions from Greece since March 2020.529 As a consequence, the concept has since been applied in breach of Article 38(4) APD, with applicants whose applications have been/are rejected as inadmissible based on Türkiye’s designation as a “safe third country” ending up in a state of protracted legal limbo, which exposes them to a direct risk of destitution and detention. The issue has consistently drawn the attention of national, UN and EU bodies, including the European Commission, with the previous Commissioner for Migration and Home Affairs having on several occasions reiterated the importance of examining the merits of these applications for international protection, in accordance with EU law. As noted by Commissioner Johansson on 7 December 2021 in response to a joint open letter by civil society organisations, “in line with Article 38(4) of the Asylum Procedures Directive, the Greek authorities should ensure that applicants whose applications have been declared inadmissible under the Joint Ministerial Decision and who are not being admitted to Türkiye should be given access to the in-merits asylum procedure”.530 Yet despite the pressure and the ongoing lack of any reasonable prospect of return to Türkiye, the Greek authorities continued examining and rejecting applications on this basis up to at least early 2025. In 2024, a total of 73,687 asylum applications were registered in Greece, 94% of which were first time asylum applications and 6% subsequent applications. Of the total, close to half were submitted by nationalities impacted by the JMD, of which 30.3% concerned Syrians, 21.1% Afghans, 2.9 % Pakistanis and 2.1% Somali nationals.531 On 21 March 2025, the Greek Council of State (CoS) annulled the JMD designating Türkiye as a “safe third country”, following applications for annulment against the Joint Ministerial Decision 42799/2021 submitted and legally represented by the Greek Council for Refugees (GCR) and Refugee Support Aegean (RSA).532 The Court held that the JMD, and thus, the national list of safe third countries, should be annulled in respect of the designation of Türkiye as a safe third country, because there was not sufficient documentation and justification for the designation of Türkiye as a "safe third country" in the reasoning of the joint ministerial decision, which cited limited international sources “without specifically evaluating the information contained therein against the criteria set forth in the law, so as to substantiate the legal requirements for the designation”. Moreover, in related decisions issued by the same Plenary of the Council of State concerning individual cases brought before it, it was ruled that the individual decisions of the Independent Appeals Committees rejecting the applicants on the ground that they had entered Greece from Türkiye should be annulled. As noted, "[s]ince it is apparent from the information in the file that Türkiye has generally suspended the readmission of applicants for international protection to its territory since March 2020, the competent Greek authorities cannot, as the Court of Justice held in its judgment of 4 October 2024 in Case C-134/23, reject applications for international protection as inadmissible on the basis of Article 33(1)(b) of the ECHR. 2(c) of Directive 2013/32/EU and the corresponding provision of national law on the ground that Turkey is a safe third country." The application for annulment of the JMD was initially submitted before the Greek Council of State (CoS) in 2022 and was discussed on 11 March 2022. 533 In a decision issued on 3 February 2023, 534 the CoS had referred a question to the CJEU for a preliminary ruling on the interpretation of Article 38 Directive 2013/32/EU. The majority opinion of the CoS had considered that it is not possible to designate a third country as safe if the readmission of the applicant to that country does not appear to be possible, as in view of Article 18 of the Charter, this would be contrary to “the purported objective of the Directive”, as 528 529 530 531 532 533 534 Indicatively see: GCR, Greece deems Turkey ‘safe’, but refugees are not: The substantive examination of asylum applications is the only safe solution for refugees, 14 June 2021, available in Greek at: https://bit.ly/3E3qgCe and Refugee Support Aegean, Joint Press Release, Eight Years of Failure of the EU – Turkey deal : the “safe third country” concept comes under scrutiny by the Court of Justice of the European Union, 14 March 2024, available here. For instance, see MoMA, New request from Greece for the return of 1.908 illegal economic migrants to Türkiye, 28 July 2021, available at: https://bit.ly/3rl5bhy; European Commission, Commission Staff Working Document: Türkiye 2020 Report, 6 October 2020, available here: https://bit.ly/3xgt4aK, 48. For a detailed overview, see previous AIDA reports on Greece, available here. Ministry of Asylum and Migration, Informative Note December 2024 – Annex, available here. GCR, Joint Press Release ‘The Council of State annuls the designation of Turkey as a 'safe third country' for asylum seekers’, 27 March 2025, available at: https://tinyurl.com/2tu6szka. GCR, Εκδικάστηκε ενώπιον του ΣτΕ η αίτηση ακύρωσης της Απόφασης με την οποία η Τουρκία χαρακτηρίστηκε ασφαλής τρίτη χώρα, 15 March 2022, available in Greek at: https://bit.ly/365HUJ9. Plenary of the Council of State, Decision no 177/2023, 3 February 2022, available in Greek at: https://bit.ly/3Gs6GSc. 103