Seventeenth Global Studies Conference

Abstract

In recent years, the Aegean Sea has become the deadliest sea for migrants and refugees from North Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia. A ship capsized with 750 migrants on June 14, 2023 in the Mediterranean Sea and sinking off the coast of Greece with 80 dead, 100 rescued and 500 missing shows the depth of tragedy of Mediterranean sea route for migrants and pushbaks practice. This study investigates Pushbacks - forcefully return migrants from EU waters to open sea and leaving them afloat in the middle of the sea in a dangerous way by Greece coastal guards and Frontex. Türkiye in addition to hosting more than 3.6 million registered Syrian refugees and hundreds of thousands of other nationalities particularly migrants and refugees from Afghanistan, it acts as a transit country for migrants to reach Greece and Italy through the Aegean Sea. Migrants and refugees from the Turkish coastal sides risk their lives and cross the Aegean Sea, and even after reaching the waters and coast of Greece, they are returned to international waters in a dangerous manner which is called Pushbacks and the pushbacks practice is illegal based on international migration laws and European migratory policies.