Thread by @LHreports

This week we released footage of Bulgarian border forces shooting a Syrian refugee. They denied it. The EU’s called for an investigation

This wasn’t an isolated incident. Today we place it in a wider system at EU borders reliant on black sites, cages & torture

THREAD

This is the cage where Abdullah, the 19yr old shooting victim revealed this week, was previously held in Bulgaria. He identified it from the video

@LHreports located the cage & found it being used to detain refugees before pushbacks like the one on Oct 3

https://twitter.com/LHreports/status/1599795979762356224

The rusting cage is just one of the active black sites we found in the EU

We also discovered shipping containers in Hungary & prison vans in Croatia are being routinely used by authorities to imprison people & prevent them claiming asylum

By searching EU & national tender systems we’ve followed the money trail from these black sites back to Brussels. We can show that they’re part funded by the EU, and in some cases operated under the noses of Frontex, the EU border agency

The cage resembles a disused dog kennel & is located in the car park of a Bulgarian border guard station in Sredets, 40km from the Turkish border

We visited the site on 5 separate days over 6wks. On every visit we observed & recorded people being detained

People held in the cage say they were not given food or water. One man can be heard in GoPro footage we captured saying his shoes had been confiscated by the police

In other cases people report having their hair or eyebrows shaved while imprisoned in the cage

The EU appears to know about this black site: we documented cars with @Frontex logos parked metres from the cage on 3 occasions

Frontex says it works with police in Sredets on 'border surveillance activities'. Internal documents show it has 10 officers based there

We found that Sredets border police station itself has been renovated twice over the last 10yrs using more than €200k in EU funds

Official data shows the EU contributed €320m to Bulgaria’s border security in the 5yrs to 2020

aop.gavazov.net/00752-2017-0050

In Croatia, people are crammed into police vans & left to bake in the sun before being pushed back to Bosnia. Footage shows people dripping with sweat

An Afghan woman told us she was held with 20+ people, incl children, in an 8-person van. 'You can't breathe,' she said

A Croatian police officer active in the border region told us that detention of asylum seekers in ‘stand-still’ vans in the heat could be happening, though according to him this would only occur when vans get flat tires

The roads on which the Croatian vans drive the refugees to the border - apparently designed to facilitate pushbacks - were financed by EU taxpayers

In total, the country’s border authorities received more than €163m in EU funding in the 5 years to 2020

In Hungary, we found refugees being held in shipping containers with no food, water or access to a toilet before being pushed back to Serbia

We captured footage of a group being taken to a container by masked officers with batons

We gathered witness testimony from people held in the containers. One Afghan man said: 'They took my shoes & our clothes and we weren’t given food'

@MSF Serbia told us when border guards want to make room for new arrivals in the containers, they reportedly use pepper spray

Also in Hungary, we documented asylum seekers being rounded up at a petrol station by civilian guards & forced to sit on the ground for hours, before being pushed back in prison buses (photo: @foldes_andras)

We captured drone footage of routine pushbacks frm Hungary to Serbia

Two Hungarian border police prison buses, used to facilitate pushbacks, were acquired in 2017 with €1.8m from EU funds

The EU has contributed more than €144m to Hungary’s border authorities between 2015-20

police.hu/hu/hirek-es-in…

Experts told us the secret detention sites we've exposed are clearly illegal & that the treatment of detainees amounts to torture

‘It’s being done to punish, deter & intimidate & therefore it meets the widely recognised UN definition of torture,’ says Liz Bates @FreefromTorture

Last year, @LHreports captured footage of violent pushbacks carried out by masked men from Croatia's border police. It was excused as an isolated incident

Today’s evidence reveals a violent, clandestine system of black sites & torture built w/ EU money

https://twitter.com/lhreports/status/1445811881218699265

Investigations like this need a coalition, so thanks to great partners @derspiegel @lemondefr @ARD_Presse #Monitor @SkyNews @DomaniGiornale @RFERL @srfnews

For a full backgrounder on the investigation:
lighthousereports.nl/investigation/…

Kudos to a big team that will need 2 tweets to fit @bash_deeb @JackSapoch @maybulman @saracreta Karim Sharif @N_Voegele @klaasvandijken @TomasStatius @foldes_andras @liselottemas @ShafaghLaghai @Julia_Regis_

@ConradinZ @SiobhanRobbins @dthiesing @horlacher_maj @MCheresheva @adamparkersky @stluedke Drago Hedl @AnnaTillack @Guldenay007 @sebnemarsu @miodrag_sovilj @Alekdracul