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Turkey in the Context of ‘Safe Third Country’ Notion

Member States of the EU were forced by the circumstances in 2015 to find a mutually acceptable way to stop the uncontrolled flow of alleged refugees and migrants from Turkey as the largest refugee hosting state worldwide to the EU. As a result, 38 Syrian nations have been returned to Turkey as of March 31, 2019, on the basis of the announced EU–Turkey statement because of inadmissibility of their applications for international protection on the basis of recognition of Turkey as a STC. As neither the EU institutions nor Greek determining authorities purposefully evaluated Turkey by the application of the STC criteria, having used pre-defined templates of inadmissibility decisions, this research is aimed at the ascertainment of a possibility of Turkey’s designation as a STC on the basis of definitive conclusions regarding Turkey’s compliance with each of the criteria enumerated in Article 38(1) of the rAPD. Upon the evaluation of the level of respect for the non-refoulement principle in Turkey and the analysis of its currently functioning asylum system, the present research emphasizes the necessity to suspend the EU–Turkey statement’s implementation and stop violations of obligations imposed on Greece and the EU by international agreements, customary international law and EU law.