'Vast number' of abuse reports on EU border, agency says

Italian police officers check immigrants just disembarked from a rescue ship

The EU’s Fundamental Rights Agency is calling for more investigations of alleged human rights abuses of migrants and refugees by the authorities at the EU’s borders, including those in the Balkans, the Mediterranean and the English Channel.

In a new report, the agency, known as FRA, said that despite “the vast number of credible reports” about loss of life and alleged ill treatment on the EU’s land and sea borders, there are very few investigations.

It said the allegations of “serious and life-threatening human rights violations” included physical violence, failure to rescue people in distress, and forced separation of families.

FRA said victims rarely report such incidents to the police, because they are in a vulnerable situation.

In France, one civil-society organisation said that only one in 10 cases reported to them in Calais led to the filing of a complaint.

Lawyers and civil-society organisations said victims are often unwilling to make complaints because they distrust the authorities or because they are frightened about possible negative impacts on their asylum procedures. Others said smugglers advise them not to report incidents.

One incident cited in the report as an example of the challenges faced by investigators occurred in October 2022, when “French police stopped an unaccompanied child hiding in a truck destined for the United Kingdom.”

The report said volunteers then found the child unconscious, with a fractured skull. They reported the case to the public prosecutor of Boulogne-sur-Mer.

But FRA said that when investigators tried to contact the child a month later, “he had left for the United Kingdom and could not be found.”

The report focuses on border management and does not cover administrative procedures relating to asylum.

FRA said the low number of investigations of such cases “casts a negative light on border management authorities’ operation.”

The Agency said even when incidents are investigated, very few national court proceedings lead to convictions. “A sense of impunity prevails,” the report noted.

FRA’s Director Sirpa Rautio said that Europe had a "duty" to treat everyone at its borders "fairly, respectfully and in full compliance with human rights law."

Ms Rautio called for "effective and rights-compliant border management practices" and robust investigations into all instances of rights abuses.