On May 23, the Greek public prosecutor referred 17 officers from the Greek Coast Guard — including commanders and senior officers — to trial, following the completion of the preliminary investigation conducted by the competent Deputy Prosecutor of the Piraeus Naval Court. This includes the referral of the captain of the Hellenic Coast Guard vessel PPLS 920, which our investigation revealed was near the Al-Mutawakkil boat before and during its sinking and failed to intervene for nearly half an hour. Charges of complicity were also brought against the entire crew of that vessel. In addition, the then-Chief of the Hellenic Coast Guard, the Supervisor of the National Search and Rescue Coordination Centre, and the two Navigation Safety Officers on duty that day, were also referred to trial on the charges of exposing others to danger, despite their legal obligation to rescue them, thereby leaving them in a helpless state, resulting to the death of at least 82 individuals.
Six Greek human rights organizations issued a joint statement supporting the criminal prosecution of 17 coast guard members for felonies related to the Pylos shipwreck. The organizations, including the Hellenic League for Human Rights (HLHR), the Greek Council for Refugees (GCR), and the Network of Social Support for Refugees and Migrants, expressed support for the criminal prosecution by the Public Prosecutor’s Office at the Piraeus Maritime Court.
ARIJ’s investigation exposes a legal system designed to dissuade migrants from travelling from Africa to Europe, rather than prosecuting criminal human traffickers or exposing the true causes of mass migrant drowning disasters. Focusing on a major disaster in June 2023, when approximately 750 migrants were lost after an overloaded fishing boat sank near Greece, this project by ARIJ revealed a legal “trap” in which nine Egyptian migrants were detained and prosecuted, in order to deflect political and media attention from the real causes of the catastrophe.
This investigation was conducted with the support of ARIJ and was published in Arabic in partnership with Al-Manasseh, Egypt. In collaboration with the Greek platform Solomon, the Spanish newspaper El Pais and the German newspaper TAZ.
