A group of aid workers who were put on trial in Greece for rescuing migrants on the island of Lesbos have been acquitted of all charges.
The 24 former volunteers were arrested seven years ago – accused of human trafficking and other offences – and could have faced up to 20 years in jail.
They had worked for an NGO that rescued asylum-seekers at risk of drowning between 2015 to 2018, when hundreds of thousands of migrants crossed the narrow straits from Turkey to Greece.
Their case was widely criticised by aid agencies and human rights campaigners as an attempt to criminalise humanitarian aid, and was seen as having profound implications for migration policy across Europe.
The defendants, who worked for the Emergency Response Centre International (ERCI), included the former Syrian migrant and former competitive swimmer Sara Mardini, who returned to Lesbos to rescue other refugees, and whose story was told in the Netflix drama, The Swimmers.
She and the others were arrested in 2018. They were cleared of some accusations, including espionage, in 2023, but their trial on the remaining charges of facilitating the illegal entry of foreigners into Greece, money-laundering and membership of a criminal organisation only began last month.
“All defendants are acquitted of the charges” because their aim was “not to commit criminal acts but to provide humanitarian aid”, presiding judge Vassilis Papathanassiou told the court on Thursday.
Prosecutor Dimitris Smyrnis had earlier recommended their acquittal, emphasising that “no independent basis establishing the criminal liability of the defendants has been demonstrated”.
During the trial, the court heard evidence from a senior police officer testifying about the defendants’ use of an encrypted messaging service, WhatsApp, to share information about the location and state of boats carrying migrants.
He testified that information had not been shared with the Greek authorities. But a Greek coast guard officer, Stavros Gagarellis, gave evidence that the volunteers had cooperated closely with his organisation.
The judge ruled that “a communication group on the internet cannot be regarded as a criminal organisation,” saying: “Waiting to rescue a human life cannot be considered facilitation of illegal entry.
“None of the defendants attempted to act in such a way as to allow any of the transported persons – refugees or otherwise – to evade inspection by the authorities,” he added.
Zacharias Kesses, the lawyer for Sara Mardini and another defendant, Sean Binder, said after the verdict: “I’m astonished that it took 2,889 days for the prosecutor to realise that the accusation made no sense whatsoever—something everyone except him already knew.”
Binder, an Irish-German lawyer who, alongside Mardini, was held in pre-trial detention for three months in 2018, said: “Right now it’s a relief and anger cocktail, equally balanced. I am obviously very relieved that I’m not going back to prison. But I’m also very angry that it’s taken this long to get here.”
Binder, now 31, has also spoken of how the allegations had affected his life: “I’ve spent the past seven years in limbo. I had hoped to have a job, a career, some savings by now. I’d have hoped to be able to be a father. I’m trained as a lawyer, but I wasn’t allowed to represent my clients until I was acquitted.”
Eve Geddie of the human rights organisation Amnesty International said: “We hope today’s decision sends a strong signal to Greece and other European countries that solidarity, compassion and defending human rights should be protected and celebrated, not punished.”
A BBC radio documentary on the case, “Assignment: Greece-Rescuers on Trial” will be broadcast on BBC World Service on Tuesday, January 20, and will available on BBC Sounds.
