The Law & The Judges
May 30, 2025
State crime, social harm
May 31, 2025
Control the Borders
Part1
The refugee crisis discourse has been widely used since 2015 to
describe the increased numbers of people, particularly from the Middle
East, South East Asia, and various African states, forcibly displaced to
Europe through Lesvos. The case study of Lesvos illustrates that the
refugee crisis and the infliction of harm is an outcome of political
decisions by various states. The argument in this chapter questions the
mainstream discourses that represent the refugee crisis as an
unforeseen, unpreventable, random event and an ‘accident’.
By examining a case study of what has been termed
‘the refugee crisis’ specifically in relation to the Greek island of Lesvos
(sometimes translated as Lesbos), you will explore the ways that the
state both generates and mitigates harms through its response,
particularly through humanitarian intervention, deterrence, violence
and criminalisation of the refugee (border-crossing) population. You
will then explore the power of discourse
Greece is a country in south-east Europe which is bordered to the
north by Albania, North Macedonia and Bulgaria and to the east by
Turkey. Through the passage of time the geographical location of
Greece has turned the region into an important crossroads between
the East and the West. The Greek island of Lesvos is situated in
the Aegean Sea, only 4.1 miles (6.6 km) from the western coastline
of Turkey.
Part2
In recent years Greece and Lesvos have attracted much attention because of the increased numbers of irregular migrants arriving, but both the country and the island have a long migration and refugee history.
People of Greece and Lesvos have memories of refugees, violence and trauma since the beginning of the 20th century. A total of 60 per cent of those now resident in Lesvos are descendants of the‘Asia Minor refugees of 1922’ (Carstensen, 2015; Pantelia, 2016), who were Greek Christian Orthodox populations who had been living in the region of Asia Minor in Turkey.
Due to the war between Greece and Turkey between 1919 and 1922, approximately one million Asia Minor refugees were forcibly displaced from Turkey to Greece and other neighbouring countries (Hernadez, 2016).
After 1922, approximately 1.2 million refugees were settled in Greece due to the population exchanges that followed between Greece and Turkey
(Green, 2010). (In Lesvos, about 45,000 Asia Minor refugees arrived by
boats and settled in various parts of the island (Papataxiarchis, 2016)
Part3
In the 1990s, Greece and Italy became important entry points into Europe for irregular migrants. It is estimated that around 600,000 irregular migrants settled in Greece during that decade, one third of whom were deemed to have come from Albania (Triandafyllidou and Veikou, 2002).
Between 2000 and 2014, Greece, the Aegean Islands, and Lesvos in
particular, became the main entry points for irregular migrants from Asian and African countries trying to reach northern European countries (Georgoulas and Sarantidis, 2013; Triandafyllidou, 2014).
The sites that were used to host irregular migrants were initially monasteries and churches, police stations, former prisons and military bases or former warehouses and public buildings (Iliadou, 2012).
There were several reports from international and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), journalists and academics documenting the
inadequate laws governing asylum procedures, the unsuitable reception
and degrading living conditions that irregular migrants faced on
entering Greek territory (Amnesty International, 2013; FRA, 2013; Human Rights Watch, 2013). Despite this, the ‘refugee issue’ in Greece and Lesvos did not attract international attention until 2015
EU values and the refugee crisis
part4
Before you examine in more detail how the refugee issue developed
after 2015, in this section you will explore three important terms
related to irregular migration.
As you will see, in official and media discourses forced displacement is frequently framed as a ‘refugee crisis’. Irregular migrants are represented as both in need of protection and as a ‘security threat’ – a contradiction in terms. Although the EU’s responses to this forced displacement are applied in the name of humanitarianism and care, they simultaneously challenge some of the EU’s core values.
According to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), displacement refers to the: movement of persons who have been forced or obliged to flee or to leave their homes or places of habitual residence, in particular as a result of or in order to avoid the effects of armed conflict, situations of generalized violence, violations of human rights or natural or human-made disasters.
EU values
The values of the EU were established in the Treaty of Lisbon, which
took effect in November 2009. They are common to all EU member
countries and form an integral part of what is known as the European
Union.
As they are defined in Article 2, Treaty on European Union, the EU values encompass ‘respect for human dignity and human rights, freedom, democracy, equality, and the rule of law’ and respect for human rights, including the rights of persons belonging to minorities.
These ‘values are common to the member states in a society in which
pluralism, non-discrimination, tolerance, justice, solidarity and equality
between women and men prevail’ (European Commission, 2019b).
Refugee crisis
Part6
Although there is no formal definition of the term ‘refugee crisis’, it is
broadly used to describe one of the worst forced displacements of
people since the Second World War.
According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the term refers to ‘the forced displacement of people crossing at least one recognised international border, creating extraordinary pressures on local resourcesand exceeding the coping mechanisms of the hosting state’
(SIPRI, 2017).
However, since 2015 there have been numerous discourses around the
term ‘crisis’ in relation to the forced displacement of people – political,
media, academic and, more broadly, public.
As a result, the ‘refugee crisis’ is alternatively labelled as a ‘migrant crisis’, a ‘humanitarian crisis’, a ‘crisis of reception’, a ‘crisis of protection’, a ‘crisis of the asylum system’, a ‘crisis of Europe’s borders’, a ‘crisis of border control’, a ‘crisis of the Schengen zone’ and a ‘crisis of European values’ (De Genova and Tazzioli, 2016; Arsenijević et al., 2017; Migreurope, 2019).
While all these terms could be accurate, the crux of the matter is that they note the failure of European states at EU, national and local level to respond effectively to the increased arrivals of irregular migrants.
The refugee crisis discourse
Part8
There are major absences in the dominant discourse around the
refugee crisis. When the crisis is described it is rarely, if ever, noted
that it is primarily a crisis in circumstances in the irregular migrant’s
‘country of origin’, that is the country from which the person has
migrated (IOM, n.d.). Hence, it is primarily a crisis for the irregular
migrants themselves since they are forcibly displaced from their homes
and fleeing from wars, conflicts, violence and persecution
(Trilling, 2018). Yet the argument that this kind of migration is not a
choice but a necessity is usually missing from those discourses.A second absent point is that under international and refugee law
obligations (most notably the 1951 Geneva Convention and the 1967
Protocol of New York) (OHCHR, n.d. a) EU countries have a
responsibility to protect irregular migrants traversing the EU borders.
This means that, according to international and refugee law, states have
certain obligations towards forcibly displaced populations. For example,
it is an obligation of any state to protect forcibly displaced populations
reaching its territories from subsequent expulsion to countries where
they face ‘a risk of torture, the death penalty, other inhuman or
degrading treatment or punishment or … treatment violating human
dignity’ (Nicholson and Kumin, 2017, p. 19).
A third crucial argument missing from dominant discourses would
challenge the view that the refugee crisis is an ‘event’ or ‘accident’. The
power of the image of Alan Kurdi, the media representation of the
refugee crisis and the official discourses around those images produced
a specific knowledge about the refugee crisis and border-related deaths.
Those discourses presented these ‘events’ and ‘accidents’ as sudden,
unforeseen, unpreventable, and tragic; as an emergency situation and a
‘state of exception’ (Agamben, 2005) for which exceptional measures
had to be taken.
In fact, the refugee crisis was not a ‘sudden’ event. It was an outcome
of political decisions and restrictive policies concerning migration and
border controls which had been implemented since the 1990s. Thesedecisions and policies, in the aftermath of the 2015 refugee crisis, have
proliferated (Iliadou, 2019a; Trilling, 2019). Those longer-term policies
were designed in order to discourage ‘undesirable’ irregular migrants
from coming to Europe. As you will see, many EU states have been
directly and indirectly implicated in the outbreak and proliferation of
the recent and ongoing wars, civil wars, and military interventions,
across the planet (De Genova and Tazzioli, 2016). Therefore,
discouraging forcibly displaced people from coming to the EU
indicates the unwillingness of EU states to take responsibility for the
harm they have produced to the affected populations and countries
(Iliadou, 2019a).
Part10
As
such, EU responses towards the crisis through policies of deterrence
and securitisation directly associate the forced displacement of people
with illegality and crime (and thus with processes of illegalisation and
criminalisation).
Through deterrence, the EU responses towards the refugee crisis
became operationalised through the proliferation, securitisation and
militarisation of borders. These processes were achieved in a series of
ways, notably through: borders and it is enforced through the logic, that ‘migrants are better
protected by being deterred from undertaking the journey in the first
place’ (Triandafyllidou and Dimitriadi, 2014, p. 149). In many EU
countries, crossing borders without authorisation is considered an
illegal act often punishable with imprisonment (FRA, 2014). In Greece,
irregular migrants can be punished with at least three months’
imprisonment and a fine of at least €1500 (Law 3386/2005, art. 83). As
such, EU responses towards the crisis through policies of deterrence
and securitisation directly associate the forced displacement of people
with illegality and crime (and thus with processes of illegalisation and
criminalisation).
Through deterrence, the EU responses towards the refugee crisis
became operationalised through the proliferation, securitisation and
militarisation of borders. These processes were achieved in a series of
ways, notably through:
. the externalisation and internalisation of the EU borders
. the erection of fences and walls at the EU borders
. a humanitarian intervention through aid (medical and legal) by non-
governmental organisations (NGOs) and the United Nations.
You will now look at the first of these, externalisation and its harmful
consequences for irregular migrants. Then you will explore
internalisation and the production of harm for irregular migrants who
manage to reach Lesvos (and therefore the EU).
Part12
The recognition of Turkey as a ‘safe country’ for irregularmigrants meant that their asylum applications could be rejected in
Greece and the migrants would face expulsion to Turkey (Gatti, 2016a,
2016b; Peers and Roman, 2016).
The EU–Turkey Statement has been criticised as harmful for irregular
migrants, since it ignores the people at the heart of the refugee crisis
by ‘significantly eroding their rights’ (Amnesty International, 2016a) in
the following ways:
. It might lead to collective expulsions without giving irregular
migrants the opportunity to apply for asylum in the EU (Gatti,
2016a).
. Due to the recognition of Turkey as a safe country almost all
potential asylum claims can be rejected, resulting in collective
expulsions or deportations to Turkey (Amnesty International,
2016a; Gatti, 2016a).
. Turkey is repeatedly criticised for systematic human rights
violations and political violence (Amnesty International, 2016b), a
dysfunctional asylum system, inequalities in access to protection,
degrading living conditions, expulsions and deportations from
Turkey (Gatti, 2016a, 2016b).
. The social and political conditions in Turkey, particularly in the
aftermath of the post-military coup severely challenge the notion of
a ‘safe country’ (Sputnik news, 2017; Amnesty International, 2018).
After the unsuccessful military coup in Turkey on 15 July 2016,
collective arrests, abuses, violations of human rights and liberties of
Turkish citizens and military men took place (Amnesty
International, 2018). An increased number of Turkish citizens have
attempted to cross the Greek–Turkish border and seek international
protection in Greece (Stockholm Centre for Freedom, 2018).
Therefore, although externalisation policies were implemented by the
EU to protect irregular migrants from harm, in practice, as you will
see below, those policies inflicted more harm upon irregular migrants
Harm through externalisation
Part13
he harms inflicted on irregular migrants due to the externalisation of
borders are multi-layered. Some of these harms are direct, but othersare created via the strengthening of regimes or multinational
companies that uphold the harmful situation.
Physical harms
Externalisation policies have produced a dramatic increase in death
tolls, since border crossings are now more perilous, higher risk and
prove fatal more often (Médecins Sans Frontières, 2015;
Akkerman, 2018). For example, for irregular migrants to avoid the
arrests and expulsions they would encounter at border controls, they
are forced to follow more risky and dangerous routes to Europe –
often in boats barely fit for purpose, which are then abandoned
Financial harms
As well as becoming more dangerous, the border crossings, have also
become more expensive. Therefore, irregular migrants are forced to
resort to smuggling and trafficking networks in order to cross the
borders, and these illicit businesses have been boosted at the expense
of irregular migrants. As Hein de Haas argues:Smuggling is a reaction to border controls rather than a cause of
migration in itself. Ironically, further toughening of border
controls will therefore force migrants and refugees to take more
risks and only increase their reliance on smugglers.
(De Haas, 2013)
Physical barriers
At the same time, fences and walls have been erected within Europe,
making the act of seeking sanctuary and international protection almost
impossible (Vaughan-Williams, 2015). After the fall of the Berlin Wall,
which was a symbol of the Cold War era, Greece was one of the first
EU countries to erect a boundary wall, at Evros in north-eastern
Greece on the border with Turkey (Baczynska and Ledwith, 2016). As
Bill Frelick, Ian Kysel and Jeniffer Podcul have written:
One of the cruel ironies in recent years is that a number of
countries that have developed rights-sensitive standards and
procedures for assessing protection claims of irregular migrants
within their jurisdictions have simultaneously established barriers
that prevent irregular migrants from setting foot on their
territories or otherwise triggering protection obligations [that is,
providing asylum].
(Frelick et al., 2016, p. 191)
Support of authoritarian regimes
A further harmful aspect of externalisation is that in order to deter and
prevent irregular migrants from reaching Europe, EU policy makers
have entered into business deals and expedient agreements with
authoritarian countries, which systematically violate human rights. The
EU provides them with funding and even sells them weapons
(Akkerman, 2017, 2018) in exchange for preventing border-crossing.
Part5
Displacement is commonly referred to as ‘forced displacement’ with
the term ‘forcibly displaced populations’ widely used. According to the
UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) at the end of 2018
the number of forcibly displaced people globally was 70.8 million.
This large-scale displacement indicates that ‘a person becomes displaced
every two seconds’ (European Commission, 2019a). Apart from the term forcibly displaced populations, you will also see the term ‘internally displaced persons (IDPs)’.
According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), this refers to populations that, although forcibly displaced from their homes, have not crossed an internationally recognised border (OHCHR, n.d. b), so ‘unlike refugees, they are on the run at home’
(UNHCR, n.d.).
Since 2015 there has been much debate and concern at EU, national and local levels, as well as in the media, about the refugee crisis being a purely European problem. EU countries, however, host only 16 per cent of forcibly displaced people (UNHCR, 2019a).
More than 80 per cent of forcibly displaced people are hosted in countries neighbouring the countries of their origin
The power of the media
Part7
In 2015, images of displaced people making desperate journeys via the
Aegean and Mediterranean Seas to seek sanctuary in Europe
dominated the news and social media. As you may remember, the
media overwhelmed audiences with images of overcrowded dinghies
floating, capsizing or sinking, as well as rescue operations carried out
by volunteers and humanitarian organisations. Over the course of 2015:
. approximately one million irregular migrants reached Europe by
sea, via Greece and Italy (Clayton and Holland, 2015)
. approximately 500,000 irregular migrants reached Europe via
Lesvos (Gillespie et al., 2016), an island with a general population
in 2016 of 86,436 people (Hernadez, 2016)
. approximately 3500 people died while attempting to cross the
Mediterranean Sea in order to seek sanctuary in Europe (UNHCR,
2019b)
The Aegean Sea – like the Mediterranean – became a deadly border
(Albahari, 2016) and Lesvos became the epicentre of the ‘crisis’ The power of the media coverage of Alan Kurdi and his family, in
combination with an increase in arrivals and rising death tolls, turned
the border at Lesvos into a spectacle of death and suffering. The islandsuddenly became famous (Iliadou, 2019b). Lesvos became a more
popular tourist destination, and attracted celebrities, volunteers and
‘voluntourists’, journalists, academics, NGOs, Pope Francis, the Queen
of Jordan and various kinds of profiteers (Gillespie, 2018). As you saw
in Chapters 4 and 5, images and discourses have huge power to move
the public and, as criminologist Alex Dymock argues, in the case of
Alan Kurdi, provoked ‘a viral outpouring of horror and rage on social
media and hurried donations of money, food, clothing, and
technological goods to charities funding foreign aid workers helping at
the camps.’ (2018, p. 197).
The media representations of the 2015 refugee crisis were a
combination of contradictory discourses and images: of empathy or
pity where human consequences were shown, and of suspicion or
hostility (Chouliaraki and Stolic, 2017; Georgiou and
Zaborowski, 2017). The latter had to do with the representation of a
large movement of people as an ‘invasion’ and a security threat (that is
linked to terrorism) for the EU external borders, which suddenly
appeared unprotected and all-too-easily permeated (Chouliaraki and
Stolic, 2017; Trilling, 2019).
Discourse is always loaded with meanings and implicit judgements
about the value and status of others. Studies show how media language
is value-driven; that is, the language used is not politically neutral. Also,
this language can be so powerful that it is able to influence public
opinion positively or negatively, and form political agendas and debates
(Berry et al., 2015). Crisis discourses – language and images – distorted
the public’s opinion of and understandings about the root causes of
the 2015 forced displacement and the refugee crisis per se.
What is a state of exception?
The concept of a state of exception has been developed by
philosopher Giorgio Agamben, examining how, under specific
circumstances – in times of crisis and emergency – states can
increase and expand their power by traversing and/or violating the
rule of law and, in practice, by operating outside the law
(Agamben, 2005). He argues that during states of exception in
supposed times of crisis, human rights and liberties can be
suspended, violated, diminished, and rejected. Measures that are
enforced in the name of a state of exception, emergency and crisis
are justified and legitimised as necessary and temporary. However,
Agamben notes that the state of exception tends to become the
rule since the exceptional measures are often prolonged and
continue to apply for years (Agamben, 2005).
Alan Kurdi
On 2 September 2015 the lifeless body of Alan Kurdi – a three-
year-old Syrian refugee – was washed ashore on the coast of
Turkey. It was only after this death that public opinion and EU
policy makers became sensitised to a process which in reality had
been unfolding since the 1990s. The image of the child’s lifeless
body shocked the public, and at the same time served as a
reminder of the human consequences of the politics of closed
borders (Iliadou, 2019a). The image is so powerful that it became
‘an allegory of refugeeness’ (Khosravi, 2011, p. 73), representing
and personifying the so-called refugee crisis. It also challenged EU
values. As anthropologist Miriam Ticktin argues, ‘The photo [of Alan
Kurdi] gave the “migrant crisis” a new face: innocence. It shamed
Europe into action.’ (2016, p. 258).
The state’s responses
Part9
We are deeply concerned by the sharp increase in flows of
refugees and irregular migrants, which entails suffering, abuse and
exploitation, particularly for children and women, and
unacceptable loss of life in the desert or at sea. Such an increase
places the most affected countries under severe pressure, with
serious humanitarian consequences and security challenges.
(European Council, 2015a, p. 1)
Thus, these EU policy makers – using the language of crisis and
emergency (De Genova and Tazzioli, 2016), humanitarianism and care
(Ticktin, 2016) – went on to express their intentions to:
. protect irregular migrants’ lives from the criminal trafficking
networks culpable for the border-related deaths
. thus prevent more deaths within the land and sea border crossroads
(European Council, 2015b, 2015a)
. restore public order.
The commitments triggered and legitimised contradictory responses: on
the one hand humanitarian interventions, on the other, securitisation
and militarised responses at the EU borders – specifically in Greece.
With regard to the refugee crisis, and more broadly the management of
borders, this contradiction occurs due to the fact that the EU
responses are implemented through deterrence. This refers to the
practice of discouraging irregular migrants from traversing the EUborders and it is enforced through the logic, that ‘migrants are better
protected by being deterred from undertaking the journey in the first
place’ (Triandafyllidou and Dimitriadi, 2014, p. 149).
In many EU
countries, crossing borders without authorisation is considered an
illegal act often punishable with imprisonment (FRA, 2014). In Greece,
irregular migrants can be punished with at least three months’
imprisonment and a fine of at least €1500 (Law 3386/2005, art. 83).
Externalisation of borders
Part11
Externalisation refers to the expansion of borders and border controls
beyond the physical borders of the EU (Frelick et al., 2016; Ruhrmann
and FitzGerald, 2016; Hess and Kasparek, 2017). Since the 1990s,
externalisation has dramatically increased, and particularly in the
aftermath of the 2015 refugee crisis (Noll, 2015; Akkerman, 2018).
Externalisation involves:
. agreements with non-EU countries, such as Turkey, to manage the
asylum procedures outside the EU borders (Ruhrmann and
FitzGerald, 2016; Akkerman, 2018)
. enhanced maritime patrol operations within the Mediterranean and
Aegean Seas (through the European Border and Coast GuardAgency (Frontex) and NATO) (Garelli and Tazzioli, 2016;
Ruhrmann and FitzGerald, 2016). The logic of these externalisation policies is to shift the responsibility
to non-EU countries, such as Turkey and Libya, for stopping and
controlling irregular migrants from entering the EU (OHCHR, 2013;
Frelick et al., 2016). These non-EU countries, which were traditionally
considered as ‘transit’ countries – that is, countries through which
(irregular) migrants pass in order to enter a country of destination – in
exchange for financial aid and technical support for building
infrastructures, have been turned into buffer zones by keeping irregular
migrants stranded there. In this regard, buffer states are turned into
the watchdogs of Europe (Fekete, 2001; Akkerman, 2018).
At the time of writing (2019), Turkey is hosting more than 3.6 million
Syrian irregular migrants, not counting the thousands of irregular
migrants from other countries of origin who are also left stranded
there (UNHCR, 2019a). Additionally, following the EU–Turkey
Statement, agreed between the European Council and Turkey in
March 2016, Turkey was recognised as a ‘safe country’ for irregular
migrants arriving after 20 March 2016 from Turkey to the Greek
Islands (European Commission, 2016; European Council, 2016;
ECA, 2017).
Part14
As
Mark Akkerman, independent researcher at Stop Wapenhandel and the
Transnational Institute, argues:
The European Union in all its policies has a fine rhetoric on the
importance of human rights, democracy and rule of law, but there
seems to be no limits to the EU’s willingness to embrace
dictatorial regimes as long as they commit to preventing ‘irregularmigration’ reaching Europe’s shores. As a result, there have been
EU agreements and funding provided to regimes as infamous as
Chad, Niger, Belarus, Libya and Sudan.
(Akkerman, 2018, p. 3).
Therefore, the EU is culpable for allowing the emergence of more
conflicts and violence as well as the production of more forcibly
displaced populations, since according to Akkerman:
the same industry selling arms to the Middle East and North
Africa, fuelling the conflicts, repression and human rights abuses
that have led refugees to flee their homes is also the key winner
of EU border security contracts.
(Akkerman, 2016, p. 1)
Support of multinational corporations
Corporations such as Airbus, Finmeccanica, Thales, and Safran have
benefited from the increased militarisation and securitisation of EU
borders but have also been actively lobbying in order to influence the
development of policies and practices (Andersson, 2014; Vaughan-
Williams, 2015; Akkerman, 2018). Military and security corporations
which manufacture and provide arms and equipment to border guards,
private security corporations, and intelligence and surveillance
multinational corporations have made profits from EU militarisation
and securitisation policies (Andersson, 2014; Loewenstein, 2016;
O’Donnell, 2016). For example, Frontex’s role in the surveillance of
EU borders has been extensively enhanced and so has its budget
(Akkerman, 2016). According to Akkerman (2017), Frontex’s budget
alone for 2016 was 67 per cent higher than for 2015.
In short, externalisation policies have led to exactly the opposite results
of those initially promised. Instead of protecting irregular migrants’
lives and tackling the trafficking networks as policy makers had
claimed, they have in fact made the migratory pathways across land
and sea more violent, risky, perilous and, indeed, fatal. As Médecins
Sans Frontières notes:
These policies have turned a foreseeable and manageable influx of
refugees into a humanitarian crisis on Europe’s beaches, borderstrain stations and motorways. The current approach of ‘non-
reception’ and closed borders has caused death, injury and chaos
… The only way Europe can stop this misery is to replace the
smugglers with a safe, legal and free alternative.
Internalisation of borders
Part15
In the previous sections you explored how externalisation policies were
implemented in non-EU countries to keep and prevent irregular
migrants from reaching EU countries. In this section you will examine
‘internalisation’ (Hess and Kasparek, 2017, p. 63). Internalisation refers
to policies that draw on the paradigm of externalisation and aim to
shift the responsibility of stopping, keeping, and controlling irregular
migrants to southern EU countries. As a result, irregular migrants are
stranded in countries such as Greece by not being allowed to continue
their journey to northern EU countries. The internalisation policieswhich crucially affect Greece and particularly Lesvos are first, the
hotspot approach, and second, the geographical restriction rule.
The hotspot approach is a policy which came into effect in May 2015
(ECA, 2017). There is no exact definition of a hotspot, but in practice
this is an approach through which the EU stated its intention to
actively support countries such as Greece, which were facing pressure
at their borders due to the increased numbers of irregular migrants.
The hotspot would in practice be a site at which various humanitarian
organisations, as well as national and EU agencies, could rapidly
intervene, operate and respond to irregular migration. As a result of
this policy however, the Greek Aegean islands, including Lesvos, were
turned into securitised and militarised spaces where multiple national
and international agencies semi-settled and operated.
In April 2015, the Moria hotspot was established in Lesvos
(Mentzelopoulou and Luyten, 2018) where EU agencies (for example
Frontex, Europol, EASO) and international NGOs undertook to
manage the processes of identification, registration, screening, asylum
and deportation of irregular migrants (ECA, 2017). Until the
implementation of the EU–Turkey Statement in March 2016, hotspots
on the islands were ‘dock-and-go’ (Tazzioli and Garelli, 2018, p. 2),
that is, the irregular migrants’ registration and identification procedures
were completed relatively quickly before leaving for the Greek
mainland and then other EU countries. After the EU–Turkey
Statement all the irregular migrants were forced to stay on Greek
islands like Lesvos for uncertain periods, from months to years.
With the EU–Turkey Statement, a geographical restriction rule was also
applied. All new irregular migrants arriving on Greek islands after 20
March 2016 were forced to stay within the inadequate infrastructure of
the hotspot camps until their claim was processed, which took up to
two years in many cases (Iliadou, 2019b). These policies were current
until the Covid outbreak in 2020.
Part17
Prolonged waiting
An important consequence of internalisation policies is the infliction of
harm as a result of bureaucratic procedures surrounding identification,
registration and asylum processes. Irregular migrants have to wait for
months or years to secure their legal status – or to be deported. This
prolonged waiting inflicts psychological harms. Additionally, irregular
migrants are intimidated, harassed and subjected to violent racist abuseon Lesvos by members of the local population and the police during
stop and search operations.
The policies have indefinitely stranded many irregular migrants on
Lesvos and effectively turned the whole island, not just the Moria
hotspot, into a ‘prison’. According to the criminologist Katja Franko
Aas, ‘one does not need prisons to be, or feel, incarcerated in the
locality’ (Aas, 2007, p. 293). As many irregular migrants say, ‘The
Island is like a prison; the only difference now is that there are no
fences; there is instead the sea’ (Iliadou, 2019b, p. 68).
Source: The Open University, Milton Keynes, 2025
Harm through internalisation
Part16
Living conditions
Irregular migrants’ reception and living conditions on Lesvos are
humiliating, degrading, inhuman and life-threatening (Leete, 2017) and
the environment and facilities within and around the Moria hotspot
have been criticised in reports by various NGOs. These reports refer
to the terrible conditions, poor infrastructure, overcrowded facilities,
and lack of access to health care and medical services under which
irregular migrants are forced to live for indefinite periods of time
(European Court for Human Rights, 2014; Médecins Sans Frontières,
2014, 2017a) It is not just the conditions but the routine practices and processes at
Moria which are inhuman. Irregular migrants are exposed to exhausting
and enduring queuing not only for the identification, registration and
asylum procedures but for almost every day-to-day basic need or
activity: there are lengthy and long queues for the lavatories, the
showers, the food and even for receiving clothes
Mental health
The welfare of irregular migrants with new or pre-existing mental
health issues has been threatened to such an extent at Moria that
Médecins Sans Frontières published a plea to the EU and Greek policy
makers ‘to stop inflicting additional suffering on people who arealready traumatised’ (Médecins Sans Frontières, 2017c). Most irregular
migrants experience multiple forms of violence and harms before they
even reach Greece, in their countries of origin and en route to Europe.
Many of them have survived wars, bombings, death and massacres;
they have witnessed the deaths and the killings of other people,
including their loved ones; many are survivors of torture, sexual
violence, and physical and psychological abuse.
The confinement and the coercion of being accommodated within
facilities like the Moria hotspot re-traumatises irregular migrants and
exacerbates post-traumatic stress disorders, by exposing them to new
harms, including death. Reliving traumatic experiences by witnessing
violence, abuse, deaths, and riots within the Moria hotspot inflicts
more pain and delivers more psychological harms which are manifested
via suicide attempts, self-harm, or psychotic episodes (Médecins Sans
Frontières, 2017b).
Part18
The EU responses were legitimised in the name of humanitarianism
and care but in essence were operationalised through deterrence. This
chapter has shown that while deterrence, externalisation and
internalisation policies may be successful – to some extent – in
regulating and preventing irregular migrants from entering Europe
through Lesvos, they inflict a whole series of further harms upon those
who do enter or seek to do so. Instead of protecting lives, the policies
have exacerbated harm, making the crossing of borders more
expensive, risky and often fatal.
The chapter has examined the situation in Lesvos, but some of the
same policies and practices – and certainly precisely the same rationales
– can be found elsewhere, for example, implemented by the US
Government in relation to the United States–Mexico border or in the
Australian Government’s efforts as it seeks to deter border crossers
from South East Asia. The focus on Lesvos clearly illustrates the
extreme, but not unique, policies which can be enforced for the
management of undesirable irregular migration. NGOs and academics
increasingly allege that Greece and specifically Lesvos consists of a
‘laboratory’ where the EU border policies concerning migration
governance are tested and improved so as to be enforced in other
regions, border zones and in-between places (ASGI, 2017;
Tazzioli, 2017). Such policies, agreed and implemented by various
states, manage borders by aiming to reduce and regulate border-
crossing by deterring irregular migrants from coming, staying or
moving forward to northern Europe.
