(ANSA-AFP) - SOFIA, FEB 8 - Bulgaria faces mounting
accusations that it is abusing people trying to cross its border
with Turkey, with asylum seekers saying they have been pushed
back, locked up, stripped and beaten. The EU member serves as a
gateway into the bloc and is trying to tighten the border to
stop a rising number of people seeking to cross, which has
reached levels unseen since 2015. "Since the beginning of last
year we have been seeing very intensive and brutal pushbacks of
people," a practice that is illegal in the EU, said Diana
Dimova, head of Bulgarian refugee help group Mission Wings.
Asylum seekers' testimonies collected by AFP and reports by the
European border guard agency Frontex likewise point to the use
of brutal methods at the Balkan nation's southeastern frontier.
Border police thwarted 164,000 "irregular crossing" attempts in
2022, compared to 55,000 in 2021, interior ministry figures
show. (ANSA-AFP).
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Bulgaria accused of brutal border pushbacks
Police thwarted 164,000 "irregular crossing" attempts in 2022