UN ‘SHOCK, DISTRESSED’ OVER 92 STRIPPED REFUGEES AT GREECE-TURKEY BORDER

Mon 17 October 2022:

 The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) says it is “deeply distressed” by “shocking reports and images” of 92 people found stripped at the Greek-Turkish border.

“We condemn such cruel and degrading treatment and call for a full investigation into this incident,” the UNHCR tweeted on Sunday.

Ankara and Athens traded accusations on Saturday after Greek authorities discovered the 92 refugees near the country’s northern border with Turkey.

On Saturday evening, Turkish Deputy Interior Minister Ismail Catakli denied Turkey’s involvement in the incident, which Greece blamed on Ankara.

“As you couldn’t find one single case of a human rights violation by Turkey, you just seek to expose the image of your own cruelty as if Turkey did it,” Catakli said on Twitter replying to a tweet by the Greek Minister of Migration Notis Mitarachi.

Catakli also called on Greece to stop “manipulation and dishonesty”.

UNHCR is deeply distressed by the shocking reports and images of 92 people, who were reported to have been found at the Greek-Turkish land border, stripped of their clothes.

We condemn such cruel and degrading treatment and call for a full investigation into this incident.

— UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency (@Refugees) October 16, 2022

Greece’s Citizen Protection Minister Takis Theodorikakos said on Sunday that refugees’ accounts suggested that they have been taken to Greece by the Turkish military police.