represented and followed up by RSA before national and European courts, concerning applicants entering Greece through the island of Lesvos, including three families from Syria (of which two include pregnant women), two families from Afghanistan, one Syrian single woman, one Palestinian single man and two unaccompanied children from Syria. Arbitrary detention en route to and in new detention facilities The Decree triggered a policy of blanket detention. Asylum seekers arriving by sea during the period of effect of the Decree were initially held under inhuman conditions in various unofficial detention sites on the islands. These included approximately 100 persons detained next to the Coast Guard premises on Samos and 250 around the Coast Guard station on Leros, and 450 persons initially held in a fenced area of the Port of Mytilene prior to being detained in the Rhodes Hellenic Navy vessel, many of them since the beginning of the month.7 As of mid-March 2020, people were moved to two new detention facilities set up on the mainland specifically for that purpose, with a view to their return to Turkey.8 The two facilities were established in Kleidi, Serres and Malakasa, north of Athens.9 Transport of persons arriving on the islands – mainly Lesvos, where most arrivals were recorded – was carried out on navy vessels, with the Rhodes vessel transporting hundreds of persons to the mainland.10 Deprivation of liberty has been imposed arbitrarily and in clear dereliction of legal standards in these cases. First, under EU and domestic law, persons expressing the intention to seek international protection benefit from asylum seeker status and corollary rights and entitlements from the moment they express such intent, regardless of registration.11 These include the right to material reception conditions 12 and freedom from detention.13 Deprivation of liberty is permissible only in exceptional cases where one of the grounds for detention of asylum seekers is established, where necessity so requires and where less coercive alternatives are not applicable. Second, where detention is used for the purpose of effecting return, as implied by the Decree, it may only be lawfully ordered if there is a reasonable prospect of removal 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Efsyn, ‘Κράτηση υπό απάνθρωπες συνθήκες’, 12 March 2020, available in Greek at: https://bit.ly/3biRTIc; Human Rights Watch, ‘Greece/EU: Allow New Arrivals to Claim Asylum’, 10 March 2020, available at: https://bit.ly/2yqfyYD; Amnesty International, Caught in a political game: Asylum-seekers and migrants on the Greece/Turkey border pay the price for Europe’s failures, March 2020, 13, available at: https://bit.ly/2VrJc8U. Ministry of Migration and Asylum, ‘Από σήμερα, ξεκινάμε τις μεταφορές σε κλειστές δομές στις Σέρρες και τη Μαλακάσα όσων παραβίασαν τα εθνικά σύνορα από 1η Μαρτίου’, 14 March 2020, available in Greek at: https://bit.ly/3aiN9RE. See also Joint Ministerial Decision 2945/2020, Gov. Gazette B’ 1016/24.3.2020, available in Greek at: https://bit.ly/3ev59eM. The detention facility is distinct from the existing open reception facility in Malakasa. The two are often referred to as “new” and “old” facility respectively. However, the status and managing authorities of the discrete facilities are not clear in the above Joint Ministerial Decision. Ministry of Migration and Asylum, ‘Μεταφορά 436 μεταναστών στην κλειστή δομή της Μαλακάσας’, 15 March 2020, available in Greek at: https://bit.ly/2yhsIau; Efsyn, ‘Απέπλευσε από το λιμάνι της Μυτιλήνης το αρματαγωγό «Ρόδος»’, 14 March 2020, available in Greek at: https://bit.ly/3be8HQT. Article 2(c) Law 4636/2019 (“International Protection Act”), Gov. Gazette A’ 169/1.11.2019, available in Greek at: https://bit.ly/3es5rU0; Article 2(b) Directive 2013/33/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 26 June 2013 laying down standards for the reception of applicants for international protection (“Reception Conditions Directive”) [2013] OJ L180/96. Article 55 International Protection Act; Article 17 Reception Conditions Directive. Article 46 International Protection Act; Article 8 Reception Conditions Directive. RSA LEGAL NOTE │ 2020 3