A.K.: Maybe at nine o clock in the evening, the door was opened. It was dark outside. The light in our barrack was switched off. All people were inside. Ten minutes before we could go out they switched on one light. They opened the door and said ‘ela’: The single one- without family without kids should go with them. ‘Take your bags from the basket place and follow us.’ We went back to the sea shore. The police boat was waiting. 21 single men – most men of our boat were Kurdish – followed their orders. They checked us again. They shouted. They were the same officers from the morning. Two came with us. Two masked men and the captain were on board. Two stayed on the beach. They took one of our boats- they put on the rope and brought us back to the sea. And then they switched off the lights, they only kept on one from behind. They shouted: ‘Go!’ And they forced us back on our boat- they treated us like animals. And they disappeared. When they were 100 meters away, they switched on their lights again. A.K.N.: They took us to the Turkish waters and threw us one by one in our boat. One of us fell in the sea and we picked him up from the water. They threw us as if we were garbage. Then they cut the rope. A.K.: What could we do? We were in the middle of the dark sea. No telephone, no lights, no motor. We started shouting. And we used our cigarette lighters. Maybe it was at 10 o’clock in the evening when the whole operation started. We sailed for about 20 minutes from the Greek military island to the open sea. And then they left us adrift. Many felt sick and vomited. Maybe an hour later, we saw another light- in about one kilometre distance. It was the other group – the families with the kids. They heard us. Allah, pity us. H.: There was no engine, no fuel on the boat and no paddles. Almost everyone vomited. We were in the sea from 10 o’clock in the evening until 5 o’clock in the morning. A.K.: An elder woman hid a phone and someone called the Turkish military and the Turkish boat came and rescued us. H.: We were in the sea all screaming, hoping someone would hear us. There was just a Turkish coastguard boat, which came twice to bring both of our groups to the land. Around 4-5 o’clock in the morning they found the group of the 25 persons and this is how they found the second boat with the men. A.K.N.: They took D. in the hospital in Didim’. 48 | aNNEX-iNTERVIEWS • Push-backs of Boats in Distress O.M., M.M. and D.M., from Syria (Afrin)153/ pushed back from Farmakonisi on 26.8.13 154 On Saturday 24.8.13, at 3 o’ clock in the afternoon, while a PRO ASYL team was on a mission in Izmir (Turkey) people we had already been interviewed informed us, that the engine of a boat carrying 14 Syrian refugees – among them were some of their relatives – broke, at approximately 2 kilometres from the island of Leros and that the persons on board were in the sea for more than 12 hours without food or water. We suggested that they should call 112 and give a distress alert, so that they could be traced. We informed UNHCR Greece. The following day, they informed us, that they had not heard from their relatives since the prior day and that the boat was missing. Subsequently PRO ASYL informed the Search and Rescue Center in Piraeus (JRCC) and UNHCR Greece again. Additionally the Frontex Headquarter in Warsaw was notified. The Turkish Coastguard was also informed by our Turkish colleagues on Sunday. PRO ASYL was also informed that one of the passenger’s brother lives in the UK and he was contacted in order to verify whether his brother was indeed in that boat and if he had heard from him. He informed us that his brother was in a boat the previous night trying to reach Leros island, but he hasn’t heard from him since he left the Turkish shore. On August 27, 2013, a member of the PRO ASYL team received a phone call from the aforementioned person, UK citizen who said that the people on that boat in distress were apprehended by the Greek Coastguard and detained on a military island and that on August 26 were pushed back to Turkey. On August 29, 2013 a researcher of PRO ASYL visited them in Izmir and interviewed them. O.M.: We left from Turkey around 3 o’clock in the night. We were 14 persons. Around 8 o’clock in the morning the boat’s engine broke. (…) We had four mobiles and four batteries, which were consumed, calling 112 telling them we need to be rescued. Someone answered 112. He told us in English: ‘You are under control we are searching for your point via satellite. Maximum at 30 minutes we will be at you. Keep your phone open’. We saw from a distance two boats from Greece’s side. They were passing behind Leros island. We thought they were Greek boats searching for us. It was around 17:00-18:00 when we saw them. 153 | As M.M and the others interviewees told PRO ASYL, he was severely beaten by non-state agents in Syria. Ever since, he has serious problems with his back. The three of them (O.M, D.M, M.M) are political dissidents in Syria. 154 | See also: ‘The Farmakonisi case’ aNNEX-iNTERVIEWS | 49