Judgment of the OVG Bremen: Greece violates the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights

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Refugees in the Greek city of Eleusis (October 2019): "the serious risk of inhuman or degrading treatment"

Photo: Eurokinissi / DPA

According to a ruling by the Bremen Higher Administrative Court, Greece is not a country in which the basic and human rights of refugees are guaranteed.

Therefore, a refugee may, under certain circumstances, file a second asylum application in Germany, even if Greece had promised him protection beforehand.

The court announced on Thursday.

If refugees return to Greece, they face "the serious risk of inhuman or degrading treatment," the court said.

This is incompatible with the European Union's Charter of Fundamental Rights.

The plaintiff from Syria received asylum in Greece in 2018.

In 2019, he reportedly traveled on to Germany and made another asylum application.

This was rejected by the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (Bamf) because according to the EU regulations only one state can grant protection.

The Bremen Administrative Court ruled accordingly in the first instance.

The Higher Administrative Court (OVG) saw the case differently: In Greece, Syrians are threatened with prolonged homelessness, will not be able to earn a living and will not have access to social benefits.

That is why the Bamf must continue the asylum procedure in Germany.

The OVG did not allow an appeal against this ruling from November.

The Bamf still has the way to appeal to the Federal Administrative Court with a non-admission complaint.

SPIEGEL and other media had spent months researching the EU's external borders in Greece and Croatia.

The research showed for the first time that the Croatian intervention police and special units of the Greek coast guard systematically abuse asylum seekers and force them back in clandestine operations so that they cannot apply for asylum.

asa / dpa