<b>Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 4th of November 2020</b> <i>Case name</i>: 20201104-AEG718 <i>Situation</i>: 30 people were pushed back in the South of Lesvos, brought to Turkey <i>Status of WTM Investigation</i>: Concluded <i>Place of Incident</i>: Aegean Sea <i>Summary of the Case:</i> On 4th of November 2020 in the early morning hours the Alarm Phone was called by travellers on a boat South of Lesvos. 27 persons, mostly woman and all from Somalia, were drifting in a white and black rubber boat. The engine wasn‘t working since hours, they told us. In the next hour the Alarm Phone was in close communication to the travellers who feared a push-back to Turkey although they were in Greek waters, as also a second GPS position showed. However, at 04:35h we called the Greek coastguards to alert them to the situation. Shortly after an email was sent to them. Unfortunately the contact to the travellers was lost afterwards. At 06h a call to Greek coastguard brought nothing to light. At 08:25h a first tweet was published. Until midday the Alarm Phone called Turkish and Greek coastguards, as well as UNHCR to find any news about what happened to the travellers. The Turkish coastguard officer told the shift team the Greek coastguard had rescued the people, but a Greek coastguard officer told the patrol boats didn‘t find the boat at the GPS position. Shortly after that the travellers sent another GPS position, now in Turkish waters, to Alarm Phone which was forwarded instantly to the responsible authorities. At 12:34h a Turkish coastguard officer said in a phone all that the Greek coastguard pushed the boat to that position. The Alarm Phone tweeted at 13:05h about this play with lives. One hour later the rescue by Turkish coastguard was still in progress and took a while because of the bad weather until 17h. All people were transferred to Izmir. At 17:52h a last tweet was published and at 18:29h the Alarm Phone got the message from the people that they are all fine but back in Turkey. We are still investigating the detailed developments and will include potential updates into this report. Alarm Phone on Twitter: 08:25h https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1323889687401058304 13:05h https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1323959670940323840 17:52h https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1324031677849653249

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