Policing and criminal justice system in Greece
Recent stories
Decree limiting free movement deemed unlawful
The Council of State has deemed unlawful a presidential decree that stipulated that refugees from third countries with a legal resident permit could only settle in particular districts.
1 July 2006 (42 words)
Irregular migrants regularised, but negative attitudes persist
There was criticism of the government's regularisation programme for undocumented migrants which ended on 30 April 2006, with an estimated 180,000 applications.
1 May 2006 (140 words)
Police brutality against Afghans in Athens
Amnesty International has demanded an investigation be held into reports that Greek police officers have subjected a group of Afghan asylum seekers to torture.
31 December 2004 (219 words)
Crime rates low among immigrants
Contrary to the general belief that most law breakers in Greece are aliens, statistics released by the Greek police reveal particularly low crime rates among immigrants.
16 December 2004 (35 words)
European Court finds Greece guilty of violating religious freedom
The European Court of Human Rights has found that Greece violated the right to religious freedom by imposing in 1999 a four month prison sentence on Mehmet Emi Aga, an ethnic Turkish Muslim.
1 December 2003 (65 words)
Police officers convicted of Roma manslaughter
In April 2002, a police officer was given a two-year suspended sentence for shooting dead a Roma man in 1996.
1 January 2003 (109 words)
Albanian claims violence on arrest
In April 2002, an Albanian, Arnesto Nesto, was arrested and charged with various crimes, including murder.
1 January 2003 (63 words)
Amnesty International documents ill-treatment, even torture
In a report published in September, Amnesty International accused Greek police of regularly abusing, and even torturing, detainees, especially members of minority groups and undocumented workers.
24 September 2002 (121 words)
NGOs concerned about abuse of foreign detainees' rights
On 15 June 2002, 47 rights groups from 22 Euro-Mediterranean countries, attending the General Assembly of the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network (EMHRN), issued a declaration expressing great concern about the frequent and grave violations of the rights of thousands of foreigners who arrive or live in Greece.
1 August 2002 (102 words)
Roma death in custody
On 24 October 2001, in a suburb of Athens, Marinos Christopoulos, a 21-year-old Romani man, was shot dead by a police officer who claims that Christopoulos failed to pull over at a road block and was then fatally wounded when he tried to run over three police officers in his car.
1 August 2002 (121 words)
Cephalonia: allegations of anti-Roma violence
A judge has filed a complaint with the ombudsman after four young Romani men were arbitrarily arrested, detained and allegedly beaten in August 2001.
1 August 2002 (61 words)
Deportation violence alleged
Joseph Emeka Okeke, a Nigerian pending expulsion from Greece, claims that officers beat him when he resisted their attempts to take him to Athens airport on 25 June 2001.
1 July 2002 (91 words)
Escape from Thrace detention centre
In June, police were searching for around seventy people who managed to escaped from a detention centre in the northeastern Thrace region in June.
25 June 2002 (117 words)
Police officer arrested
In April, a Greek police officer was arrested, and accused of helping to smuggle eighty illegal immigrants from Turkey to Greece.
12 April 2002 (29 words)
Zakynthos: no haven for Kurdish and Iraqi refugees
Amnesty International, the Greek Communist Party (KKE) and 'Doctors without Borders' called on the government to consider possible asylum applications, after the coastguard in the western Greek island of Zakynthos towed a ship loaded with 1200 refugees, most of them Kurds and Iraqis, to safety after an engine fire and gale-force winds left it drifting at sea.
9 January 2002 (235 words)
AI cites cases of police violence towards Albanians
AI has documented several cases highlighting police attitudes towards Albanian migrants, who are increasingly subjected to fishing expeditions for illegal immigrants.
1 January 2002 (121 words)
Zefyri Rom dies in police custody
The ERRC has called for an independent investigation after Marinos Christopoulous, a 21-year-old Romani man, was killed after an incident with police on 24 October 2001 in Zefyri, in the Attica region of Greece.
1 January 2002 (136 words)
Greece forces back African refugees 'dumped' by Turkey
While the Turkish army has been forcing African refugees to cross into Greece, the Greek border police have responded with similar brutality, forcing the Africans back into Turkey.
1 October 2001 (453 words)
Police who shot dead Roma acquitted
In February 2000, a court ruled that charges, including murder, against police officers involved in the killing of a Romani man in 1988, should be dropped.
1 January 2001 (90 words)
Immigrant youth shot dead in Thessalonika
On 25 March, an 18-year-old immigrant youth was shot dead by police in Thessalonika.
1 August 2000 (47 words)
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