Turning Lesbos into an Island of Detention, one Transfer at a Time
Since late August, ferries carrying people on the move have come and gone at the port of Mytilene on Lesbos, Greece. They bring those newly arrived on Crete to Lesbos, and take those who have completed screening and were referred to the regular asylum procedure to the mainland, while those referred to the border asylum procedure remain behind on the island. This observed pattern evidences that transfers are no longer an emergency response to increasing pressure on Crete, but form an operational practice that turns Lesbos into an interim destination where people are held during screening or the border asylum procedure. Both of these procedures require detention-like conditions, turning Lesbos into an island of mass de-facto detention, one transfer at a time.
Transfers from Crete to Lesbos
By early November, more than 21,000 people on the move have arrived on Crete, numbers which already surpassed those of 2025. The island is now Greece’s main arrival point, yet it provides no reception system: in Ierapetra, overcrowded temporary accommodation results in people reportedly sleeping outside or in a municipal vehicle shed, despite winter storms approaching. Due to the insufficient capacity to accommodate and register arriving people, transfers from Crete to the Eastern Aegean islands have been observed. The first transfer of 217 people from Crete to Lesbos took place on 23 August. Further transfers followed on 12 September, 23 September, 7 October and 28 October. The most recent arrived at Mytilene port in the early hours of 4 November, carrying 240 people. In total, 1,760 people have been transferred from Crete to Lesbos, but people have also been moved to other islands, such as Samos, Kos and Leros, though in lower numbers.
Although the first transfer was presented as an emergency response to the pressure caused by the large number of arrivals on Crete, the continuous transfers suggest an operational arrangement of the implementation of the New Pact on Migration and Asylum. In accordance with the Screening Regulation (EU) 2024/1356, all persons arriving irregularly on European territory must undergo screening, which serves identification, registration and collection of all information needed to refer people to either the regular asylum procedure or the border asylum procedure. The screening is framed as a pre-entry procedure, whereby individuals undergoing it are deemed not to have formally entered the EU despite their physical presence. This legal fiction of non-entry prohibits further entering EU territory and thus, requires people to remain at the disposal of the authorities. In practice, the operation of the fiction enables de facto detention of individuals subject to screening, thereby necessitating facilities capable of accommodating and confining them, such as Closed Controlled Access Centres (CCACs) on the Aegean islands. Since Crete lacks facilities suited to do this, people arriving there are transferred to islands whose CCACs can carry out screening. Moreover, with plans to establish reception facilities on Crete stalled, transfers to Lesbos are likely to continue in the foreseeable future.
Transfers from Lesbos to Mainland
The North Aegean Regional Council has raised disagreement with the transfers, concerned that the islands will again become a centralised destination for people arriving in Greece, and objecting to having to absorb pressures faced by increased arrivals in Crete. As a response, the Greek Minister of Migration and Asylum has reiterated that transfers are intended to facilitate the registration of newly arrived people on the move, rather than to establish their long-term presence on the island. The government's commitment to keep the population in the CCAC on Lesbos low, accommodating people only for the duration of screening, relies on transfers off the island to make space for those newly arriving. From 12 June until the end of September, 2,050 people were transferred to the mainland after completing screening on one of the Aegean islands. Transfers off the islands also continued on Lesbos, with 181 people being transferred to Piraeus and subsequently brought to other facilities on the mainland on 6 November. It has been observed based on information shared by the Protection Working Group on Lesbos that the people transferred to the mainland were referred to the regular asylum procedure, whereas those remaining on the islands were referred to the border asylum procedure.
This pattern of transferring only applicants subject to the regular asylum procedure can be explained by the different restrictions on movement governing the two procedures. While asylum applications of individuals in the regular procedure can be processed elsewhere within the Member State, individuals in the border procedure are required to remain in the vicinity of external borders (Art 54 Asylum Procedure Regulation (EU) 2024/1348). Capacity for screening is thus largely produced by relocating people in the regular asylum procedure off the island. Gaps in interpretation services add to this: Bangladeshi applicants, for instance, are transferred to the mainland because the islands cannot provide interpreters.
Those remaining on the island are mostly subject to the border asylum procedure, which automatically applies to asylum seekers from countries with low recognition rates (Art 42 and 45 Asylum Procedure Regulation (EU) 2024/1348). It continues the application of the legal fiction of non-entry, prolonging de facto detention of individuals beyond their initial confinement during screening. These containment practices can be understood through the concept of the politics of non-entry, (Art 43(2) Asylum Procedure Regulation (EU) 2024/1348) where confinement extends beyond designated detention facilities to subject asylum seekers to detention-like conditions at the border to more easily facilitate their potential return.
Consequences for Access to Asylum and Continuity of Protection
For People Transferred Away From Lesbos
Those in the regular asylum procedure transferred from Lesbos and other Eastern Aegean islands to the mainland experience disrupted and delayed access to asylum. Legal organisations working on Lesbos reported cases of asylum seekers being transferred the night before scheduled interviews, leaving them facing lengthy waits without information on replacement appointments. Such disruptions not only prolong asylum procedures, but also interrupt access to legal support providing information necessary to pursue asylum claims. For unaccompanied minors, they may also disrupt guardianship arrangements, further prolonging asylum claims and hindering access to protection.
For People Transferred to Lesbos
The observed operational practice of transfers turns Lesbos into an interim destination for screening and border asylum procedures as an expression of the politics of non-entry. Both procedures rely on the application of the legal fiction of non-entry, whereby people on the move, despite their physical presence on EU territory, are treated as not having formally entered it. This separation of legal presence from physical presence not only enables the imposition of detention-like conditions, but also risks undermining the protective legal framework traditionally associated with territorial presence. This is particularly concerning in the context of asylum procedures, where restrictions on movement create barriers to accessing legal support during the asylum process, thereby undermining the effective enjoyment of procedural safeguards designed to ensure fair examination of international protection claims. Furthermore, such confinement practices aimed at facilitating swift returns of rejected asylum seekers risk undermining the principle of non-refoulement. The emerging practice of using Lesbos as a site of confinement therefore raises serious concerns about the islands' role within the Greek migration management system following the implementation of the Pact on Migration and Asylum, as well as the implications of this model for the effective protection of the right to asylum.
The looming opening of Vastria, the new CCAC on Lesbos, sharpens these concerns. Located amidst a remote pine tree forest, designed with high-security fences and security towers, its prison-like architecture confirms what the observed transfer patterns have been pointing towards: the implementation of the new Pact institutionalized politics of containment, risking to turn Lesbos into an island of mass detention.
Words by Lotta Bader, Advocacy Officer Greece