Only in German: Pro Asyl – The German association ProAsyl documented the fatal consequences of the EU-Turkey. The first consequences are way worse than what we expected. People that were returned back to Turkey are being detained. In fact, there is no possibility to apply for asylum and the detainees are being forced to declare their willingness to voluntarily leave the country. If they don’t, they face prison for month.

Only in German: Statement ybyAndrej Hunko, MP from Die Linke, Germany – The debate on visa liberations for Turkish citizens coming to the EU is centered on the Turkish anti-terror law at the moment. The Turkish government and it’s president Erdoğan are using the very broad definition of the word terror to persecute the opposition. This doesn’t seem to be a problem for the German government: Since a long time already they are cooperating on this matter with their Turkish partners. Same goes for the fight on ‘human smuggling’. It needs to be emphasized that refugees are not forced on these boats crossing the Aegean but they depend on the black economy of smuggling because of the EU-migration policy.

Statewatch – A letter from the European Commission to the Greek authorities setting out why Turkey should be considered a safe third country has been condemned by a Greek human rights group as an attempt “to establish standardized reasoning for systematically denying the asylum claims of Syrian and non-Syrian nationals as inadmissible in Greece.”

GUE/NGL – “What Merkel, Tusk and Timmermans should have seen during their visit to Turkey” – report by a delegation of three Members of the European Parliament who visited Turkey on May 2-4, to assess the situation of refugees after the EU-Turkey deal. The delegation included Cornelia Ernst, Marina Albiol and Josu Juaristi, all members of the GUE/NGL Group in the EP.

Human Rights Watch – Turkish border guards are shooting and beating Syrian asylum seekers trying to reach Turkey, resulting in deaths and serious injuries, Human Rights Watch said today. The Turkish authorities should stop pushing Syrian asylum seekers back at the border and should investigate all use of excessive force by border guards.

Statewatch –  Council of the European Union: Standard Operating Procedures implementing the mechanism for resettlement from Turkey to the EU as set out in the EU-Turkey Statement of 18 March 2016.

Mülteci-Der – It has been reported from various provinces – especially from the provinces near the border with Syria, such as Hatay, Gaziantep and Şanlıurfa – that since February 2016, registration of people for temporary protection (TP) has been getting difficult and that there is almost a suspension of issuing of TP registration cards.

Last year in Izmir, there existed five registration centres where police took ID details, finger prints and photos of those who wanted to register, and issued TP ID cards which enabled people under TP to get access to public services, including health and education. The number of registration offices was reduced to two.

Council of Europe – The EU-Turkey Agreement of 18 March 2016 was adopted as a response to the unprecedented numbers of refugees and migrants arriving in western Europe via the Eastern Mediterranean and Western Balkans route. It raises several serious human rights issues relating to the detention of asylum seekers in the “hotspots” on the Greek Aegean islands, the return of asylum seekers to Turkey as a “first country of asylum” or “safe third country”, the Greek asylum system’s inadequate capacity to administer the asylum process in the hotspots and delays in the provision of EU support to Greece, the likely low level of resettlement of refugees from Turkey, and delays in the disbursement of EU financial assistance to Turkey’s efforts to support Syrian refugees.

In order to ensure that human rights and procedural guarantees of international, EU and national law are respected, the Parliamentary Assembly should make recommendations intended to address these issues to Greece as an implementing partner of the Agreement, and to the European Union, its member States and other States participating in EU resettlement and relocation schemes.

Only in German: Pro Asyl – Rechtsgutachten zur Frage, ob die Türkei als „sicherer Drittstaat“ eingestuft werden kann im Auftrag von Pro Asyl.