Dhe human rights organization Amnesty International accuses the Baltic EU state of Latvia of arbitrarily detaining, torturing and deporting people seeking protection. Accordingly, men, women and children from countries such as Syria and Iraq were held in unknown locations in forests on the border with Belarus and later illegally pushed back to the neighboring country. This results from the survey of migrants and our own research, according to a report published on Thursday. Amnesty called on the EU to stop Latvia’s actions.
“Latvia has given those seeking protection a cruel ultimatum: either they agree to a ‘voluntary’ return to their country of origin, or they are stranded at the border, where they face detention, torture and unlawful deportation. All of this has nothing to do with border protection and blatantly violates international law and EU law,” criticized Julia Duchrow from Amnesty International Germany.
Latvia accuses the authoritarian rule of neighboring Belarus under ruler Alexander Lukashenko of bringing migrants from crisis regions to the border in an organized manner. In late summer 2021, the situation at the EU’s external border escalated. Thousands of people tried to enter the European Union illegally.
The government in Riga then imposed a state of emergency in the border region with Belarus, which has since been extended several times. This enabled the Latvian authorities to undermine the right to asylum and “summarily forcibly deport these people to Belarus,” writes Amnesty. At the same time, the human rights organization raised serious allegations against the leadership in Minsk.
