8 DETENTION AND DECISIONS ON THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF RETURN Detention may be imposed when asylum applications are rejected in the second instance. In this case, a return decision (to country of origin) is issued. Detention decisions are often issued and then renewed for more than three months. In this instance, detention serves as a means of safeguarding an individual’s return to Turkey in accordance with the EU-Turkey Statement and the EU-Turkey Readmission Agreement. 74 However, since 30 March 2020, Turkey has suspended the return of migrants whose asylum applications were rejected by Greece, invoking COVID-19 restrictions. This suspension was ongoing at the time of writing this report (October 2021). Asylum seekers whose protection claims have been rejected face an impossible situation: the Greek authorities keep them in detention for the stated purpose of returning them to Turkey, while Turkey rejects all returns, with no indication of when it might review this policy. Despite this Catch-22 situation, the Greek authorities often do not consider – even in cases of impossibility of return to Turkey – alternative measures to detention. The Greek Ombudsman has recently issued a recommendation in the case of 19 migrants detained in the Pre-Removal Centre on Kos island. 75 They had their applications rejected in the second instance and were subsequently kept in detention for more than six months. The Ombudsman concluded that detention cannot be acceptable in the context of the impossibility of return. The Ombudsman reminded the Greek authorities that in such cases, detention contradicts both national and EU legislation. Specifically, Article 30(4) L.3907/2011 stipulates that ‘…when it becomes obvious that there is no reasonable perspective of return for legal or any other reasons … detention is abrogated and the third country national is released’. In the same vein, the Return Directive 2008/115/EC introduces the principle of proportionality and states that ‘detention is justified only for the preparation of return or for the execution of the deportation procedures and if the application of less forced measures is not enough’. 76 Moreover, the European Court of Human Rights has ruled that detention is justified only if procedures for removal are in progress. 77 If the procedures are not carried out with due diligence, detention is not justifiable. 78 21