BBC report on migrant pushbacks 'science fiction': Greece

Greece's Migration Minister Thanos Plevris on Thursday slammed as "science fiction" a BBC report that Athens was deploying masked migrants to push back other migrants trying to enter from Turkey.

Greece has repeatedly been accused by NGOs and media of using illegal means to keep migrants out of a country that is a key transit point for people trying to reach Europe.

The BBC said it had "wide-ranging" evidence that Greek police had since 2020 recruited migrants "to violently push other migrants back across its land border with Turkey".

It said that "masked" migrants had been used to often violently push back undocumented entrants.

Plevris told the Action television channel: "The BBC essentially adopts the views of illegal migrant smugglers," adding that the report was "science fiction."

Plevris, who is known for his anti-immigration stance, said Greece "would continue to keep its borders closed for the European union and the United Kingdom."

An investigation released in 2022 by the Lighthouse Reports media with France''s Le Monde, German magazine allemand Der Spiegel and Britain's The Guardian alleged similar tactics used at the Greece-Turkey frontier.