Luděk Stavinoha

bsky.app/profile/stav...

Reminder: Europol refuses to delete personal data of thousands of people-including humanitarian activists-unlawfully transferred by Frontex for almost a decade.

Greece’s smuggling crackdown: are refugees carrying the can? Despite the stories of mass arrests, most “smugglers” jailed in Greece are asylum-seekers who were coerced into driving boats.

Despite the stories of mass arrests, most “smugglers” jailed in Greece are asylum-seekers who were coerced into driving boats.

Fast-track trials and flawed evidence raise serious concerns about justice. #EMIF @voxeurop.bsky.social

wearesolomon.com/mag/format/f...

NEW: French police have caused the deaths of dozens of people by intercepting small boats at sea

These violent tactics are deployed now off the French overseas island of Mayotte

Under pressure from the UK, France now plans to start intercepting boats in the Channel

This is where that could lead ⬇️

Enfrentamiento entre España y Frontex: dudas sobre el uso de los datos que se obtienen de los migrantes Documentos internos a los que ha tenido acceso EL PAÍS revelan tensiones entre la agencia de la UE y las autoridades españolas por las entrevistas a los recién llegados

Frontex doesn't like to hear its 'voluntary' interviews of people arriving at Europe's shores being described as covert 'interrogations'. Why? Because it has no legal mandate to interrogate and criminalise migrants.

Yet, that is precisely what's happening in Spain.

elpais.com/espana/2025-...

«Ενεργήσαμε βάσει εντολών» - Τι υποστηρίζουν οι Λιμενικοί της Πύλου στο Solomon Το Solomon συνάντησε τον δικηγόρο των Λιμενικών του πληρώματος του ΠΠΛΣ-920 που κατηγορούνται για την πρόκληση του πολύνεκρου ναυαγίου της Πύλου. Παρουσιάζουμε τους ισχυρισμούς τους, αλλά και το αναλυ...

Παρά την ποινική δίωξη εις βάρος τους, το σύνολο των λιμενικών που εμπλέκονται στο ναυάγιο της Πύλου παραμένουν σε ενεργό υπηρεσία.

Ο κυβερνήτης του ΠΠΛΣ-920 έχει προαχθεί.
@giorgoschristides.bsky.social @supergalactica.bsky.social @wearesolomon.bsky.social

wearesolomon.com/el/mag/forma...

Frontex’s budget stands at €1 billion.

Yet it demands €7,680 in legal fees from a refugee who endured seven pushbacks and dared to fight back.

The EU’s legal system is designed to deter, not protect.

👉 www.publico.es/sociedad/mig...

Full access to the story here: archive.li/2025.09.08-0...

A review of multiple court rulings shows how debriefings fuel the criminalization of boat drivers, with Frontex officers identifying suspects and potential witnesses. In some cases, Spanish officers assigned to Frontex, who interviewed the migrants, even appeared as witnesses in court proceedings.

With @lolahierro.bsky.social & @balkanizator.bsky.social we reveal that, despite recent changes in protocols, Frontex 'debriefings' continue to be (ab)used to obtain information about smuggling suspects - often ordinary migrants criminalized for driving boats - without lawyers and legal safeguards.

Enfrentamiento entre España y Frontex: dudas sobre el uso de los datos que se obtienen de los migrantes Documentos internos a los que ha tenido acceso EL PAÍS revelan tensiones entre la agencia de la UE y las autoridades españolas por las entrevistas a los recién llegados

Frontex doesn't like to hear its 'voluntary' interviews of people arriving at Europe's shores being described as covert 'interrogations'. Why? Because it has no legal mandate to interrogate and criminalise migrants.

Yet, that is precisely what's happening in Spain.

elpais.com/espana/2025-...

Enfrentamiento entre España y Frontex: dudas sobre el uso de los datos que se obtienen de los migrantes Documentos internos a los que ha tenido acceso EL PAÍS revelan tensiones entre la agencia de la UE y las autoridades españolas por las entrevistas a los recién llegados

Frontex and Spanish police claim they do not covertly interrogate newly arrived migrants.

But evidence we obtained suggests otherwise, casting serious doubts about compliance with EU data protection rules and the alleged voluntary nature of 'debriefing' interviews.

elpais.com/espana/2025-...

Access full story without paywall: archive.li/htzCs

bsky.app/profile/stav...

This story w/ @lolahierro.bsky.social & @balkanizator.bsky.social builds on our investigation into large-scale - and unlawful - transfers of personal data between Frontex and Europol, drawing thousands of people into criminal databases:

Enfrentamiento entre España y Frontex: dudas sobre el uso de los datos que se obtienen de los migrantes Documentos internos a los que ha tenido acceso EL PAÍS revelan tensiones entre la agencia de la UE y las autoridades españolas por las entrevistas a los recién llegados

Frontex and Spanish police claim they do not covertly interrogate newly arrived migrants.

But evidence we obtained suggests otherwise, casting serious doubts about compliance with EU data protection rules and the alleged voluntary nature of 'debriefing' interviews.

elpais.com/espana/2025-...

262 Czech journalists call on Czech Authorities to help their colleagues in Gaza The open letter is a translation of a call published by 15 international press freedom groups in early August. The number of signatures is unprecedented in Czech journalism. Almost all major Czech…

🇨🇿#CzechRepublic: In an important show of international solidarity, 262 Czech journalists from 66 newsrooms, including 23 editors-in-chief & some of the biggest names in Czech journalism, have called on Czech President & PM to support journalists in #Gaza.

buff.ly/fFhLQmZ

"To generate knowledge in the context of hunger is to think through pain. To teach students who have not eaten and still tell them their voices matter. To insist, against all odds, that Gaza still thinks, still questions, still creates.

That, in itself, is an act of resistance."

In Gaza City, we are saying goodbye Forced expulsion is looming and we know this time we may never see our homes again.

"Do not forget me, Sara Awad, a Palestinian student, whose biggest dream is to finish her degree in English literature and become a professional journalist...

Do not forget how fiercely we resisted and held on to our homes and land, even when the world all but abandoned us."

aje.io/ymvlk3

I’m a Teenager In Gaza. And I Am Starving. What hits you first is the exhaustion carved into every face. The sickly pallor. The terrifying weight loss ravaging everyone—yes, including me.

"What hits you first is the exhaustion carved into every face. The sickly pallor. The terrifying weight loss ravaging everyone, yes, including me."

www.thenation.com/article/worl...

Frontex unlawfully shared thousands of people's personal data with Europol Under the banner of fighting migrant smuggling, Frontex has collected, and unlawfully siphoned to Europol, personal data for years—quietly drawing thousands of migrants, as well as EU citizens aiding ...

For years, human rights advocates have warned of the criminalisation of migrants & activists at Europe’s borders.
With @balkanizator.bsky.social & @lolahierro.bsky.social we shed light on the opaque role of Frontex and Europol in drawing thousands into this dragnet.
wearesolomon.com/mag/format/i...

More evidence of Europol's apparent disregard for legal norms and boundaries - this time from Lesvos, where its officers appear to be behaving like secret intelligence agents, misusing Frontex activities to interrogate migrants.

Akhras, a child and adolescent psychiatrist, lost his home to an Israeli strike, in early 2024. He and his family have been displaced multiple times, living in tents where the canvas sweats from too many bodies pressed into too little space. He no longer sits in a white-walled office or wears a badge. But he continues to work, seeing some fifty patients a day, most of them children. One of his regular patients is a young girl, no older than fourteen, who survived a strike that killed her entire family. She woke up in an I.C.U., alone, unable to understand where everyone had gone. Now she sits in front of Akhras in silence, until she asks, again and again, if he can bring them back. He has no answer, only a pencil stub and a coloring book, which he hopes she can use to express and process her emotions.

Read this passage, please, about trying to provide therapy for trauma in Gaza, even though it should make you feel like you are stabbing needles into your eyes.

www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...

Open letter from UK university staff: Request for biometric deferral and safe evacuation of incoming Palestinian students and scholars from Gaza to UK Universities More than 40 students currently trapped in Gaza with full scholarships to UK Universities are asking for a safe route to come and study. We, the academic community hoping to welcome these scholars, ca...

An open letter has been launched today (27/7/25) for members of the UK academic community (academics and other university staff) to sign, to press the UK Home Office to facilitate safe passage out of Gaza for 40+ students with offers for UK universities.

docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Europol's deepening aversion to transparency We are alarmed by Europol arrogating to itself the right to develop surveillance tools, which are likely to dramatically transform the landscape of policing across the EU, in almost complete secrecy. ...

This rare insight into Europol's rogue day-to-day activities in EU-funded refugee camps comes from a heavily redacted Frontex document I obtained via FOI.
Given Europol's brazen disregard for transparency, it's unlikely the police agency will disclose further details:
euobserver.com/migration/ar...

For years, the EU’s border agency unlawfully transferred data on migrants and activists to Europol An investigation by several media outlets, including EL PAÍS, reveals that Frontex provided the European police agency with indiscriminate information on thousands of people, gathered from covert inte...

This comes on the back of our latest investigation with @lolahierro.bsky.social and @balkanizator.bsky.social, revealing Europol's apparent refusal to delete/restrict using data of more than 11,000 people Frontex had unlawfully shared since 2016.

english.elpais.com/internationa...

More evidence of Europol's apparent disregard for legal norms and boundaries - this time from Lesvos, where its officers appear to be behaving like secret intelligence agents, misusing Frontex activities to interrogate migrants.

You would think Frontex would be a bit more reticent about celebrating a collaboration based on violent pushbacks, beatings, and degrading treatment of migrants - as documented by its own Fundamental Rights Officer in more than 25 Serious Incident Reports since 2023.

For years, the EU’s border agency unlawfully transferred data on migrants and activists to Europol An investigation by several media outlets, including EL PAÍS, reveals that Frontex provided the European police agency with indiscriminate information on thousands of people, gathered from covert inte...

🚨 New investigation co-authored by our colleague @stavinoha.bsky.social: EU agencies #Frontex & #Europol unlawfully shared data, sweeping up migrants and #HumanRights defenders.

Published in @elpais.com, @lemonde.fr, Solomon, @netzpolitik.org

Read more: english.elpais.com/internationa...

Frontex in Serbia — a catalogue of 12 months of denials As the European Parliament's LIBE committee discusses its draft report on Frontex in Serbia on Thursday, we document 12 months of serious and escalating violence from Serbian authorities against peopl...

euobserver.com/migration/ar...

You would think Frontex would be a bit more reticent about celebrating a collaboration based on violent pushbacks, beatings, and degrading treatment of migrants - as documented by its own Fundamental Rights Officer in more than 25 Serious Incident Reports since 2023.