What are illegal pushbacks?

Illegal pushbacks — sometimes called illegal refoulements — are forcible border practices in which states or authorities send migrants or asylum seekers back across an international border without assessing their individual situation and without giving them access to asylum procedures or protections. In these actions, people are effectively denied the basic right to seek protection even if they are fleeing violence, war, persecution, or other dangers.

Definition and Core Characteristics

The European Migration Network defines a pushback as measures taken by a state that result in migrants — including those seeking asylum — being forcibly returned across a border without access to protection or the ability to apply for asylum.

According to widespread human rights reporting, pushbacks typically share the following traits:

1) They are summary expulsions without individual assessment

Illegal pushbacks do not include an individualized determination of someone’s right to international protection. Instead, states push people back collectively without examining their personal circumstances or claims for asylum. This lack of individual review is one of the key reasons legal experts and human rights bodies consider pushbacks unlawful.
🔗 See the European Migration Network definition: summary forced return “without access to international protection or asylum procedures or denied any individual assessment of protection needs.
🔗 The UN Special Rapporteur has stated that without individualized assessments, pushbacks violate the prohibition on collective expulsion and heighten other human rights violations.

2) People are often pushed back immediately after crossing or attempting to cross a border

Pushbacks frequently happen at the earliest point of contact, often before a person can set foot on territory in a legal sense or interact with any procedures that would allow them to claim asylum. In practice, this can look like:

  • Being turned back from the land border minutes after arrival; or
  • Being pushed back at sea before any asylum interview or registration takes place.

👉 This immediate return deliberately short-circuits the legal protections that would normally apply once someone reaches the border.
🔗 The working definition of pushbacks used by academic and human rights commentators confirms that states often force people back “without an individual assessment … from the country or territory where they attempted to cross an international border.”

3) Asylum procedures and legal rights are denied

When people are subjected to pushbacks, they are not granted access to asylum procedures, even if they clearly express a fear of persecution or request protection. This is one of the clearest instances where pushbacks violate international law.

  • Individuals don’t get an interview with immigration authorities.
  • They usually have no opportunity to lodge a formal asylum claim.
  • They are returned even if they say they might face violence, torture, or persecution upon return.

This stands in stark contrast to lawful asylum processes, which require access to a fair procedure for assessing a case.

📌 UNHCR (United Nations Refugee Agency) repeatedly emphasizes that such summary returns are incompatible with non-refoulement obligations and must not result in people being sent back without legal review and safeguards.

4) They involve no legal process, no access to interpreters, lawyers, or due process rights

Pushbacks are characterized by the absence of procedural safeguards that are required when dealing with vulnerable people at borders. These include:

  • Legal representation
  • Interpretation services
  • Information about rights
  • Access to appeal mechanisms
  • Administrative or judicial review

Without these safeguards, people are returned with no meaningful chance to contest their case or have someone advocate on their behalf.
🔗 The Danish Refugee Council’s “Protecting Rights At Borders” initiative notes that pushbacks are expulsions “without legal justification and procedure,” often carried out with no respect for individual rights or access to protection.

5) Pushbacks are different from lawful deportations or removals

Pushbacks must be distinguished from legal deportations or removals, which are officially sanctioned processes under domestic and international law. Here’s the difference:

✔️ Lawful deportation/removal includes:

  • A formal administrative decision
  • Case-by-case consideration of the individual
  • Clear legal basis and transparency
  • Due process rights like appeal, representation, and explanation

❌ Pushbacks include:

  • No formal administrative action
  • No individual analysis
  • No judicial review or appeal rights
  • Often violent or summary action

The lack of due process is one reason why scholars and legal bodies describe pushbacks as incompatible with international human rights and refugee protection law.

Pushbacks are different from lawful deportations or removals because those require formal procedures, case-by-case legal review, and often judicial oversight.

Why Pushbacks Are Illegal

🔹 Violation of Non-Refoulement

One of the most important legal principles in refugee and human rights law is non-refoulement — the rule that a person fleeing danger or persecution must not be returned to a place where they risk serious harm. This principle is enshrined in:

  • The 1951 Geneva Refugee Convention;
  • The Universal Declaration of Human Rights;
  • Various regional human rights instruments (including EU laws).

Illegal pushbacks violate this rule because people are returned without a proper assessment of their protection needs.

🔹 Collective Expulsions

Under the European Convention on Human Rights (Protocol 4) and EU law, collective expulsions of foreigners without individual review are prohibited. Pushbacks almost always violate this principle when applied to asylum seekers.

🔹 Other Human Rights Violations

Pushbacks often violate multiple basic rights, including:

  • Right to life and right to seek asylum;
  • Prohibition of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment;
  • Rights to due process and fair procedures under international law.

In maritime contexts, International Maritime Law obliges ships to rescue people in distress — a contrast to pushbacks at sea where people are abandoned or forced back into danger.

What Pushbacks Look Like in Practice

While legal definitions are essential for understanding why pushbacks are unlawful, the reality on the ground is often far more brutal. In practice, pushbacks are not neutral administrative acts; they are frequently violent, degrading, and life-threatening operations carried out at land borders and at sea. Extensive documentation by NGOs, journalists, and international organizations reveals recurring patterns across multiple countries.

Widespread and systematic practice at Europe’s external borders

Human rights organizations have documented hundreds of thousands of pushbacks at Europe’s external borders in recent years. These are not isolated incidents or the result of rogue officers, but systematic practices that occur repeatedly along key migration routes, including the Balkans, the Eastern Mediterranean, and land borders in Eastern Europe.

According to joint NGO monitoring efforts, people attempting to seek protection in the European Union are routinely:

  • Intercepted by border police or military forces;
  • Prevented from lodging asylum claims;
  • Forcibly returned to neighbouring countries without any legal procedure.

🔗 Border Violence Monitoring Network (BVMN) – ongoing documentation of large-scale pushbacks in Europe
https://borderviolence.eu/

🔗 Danish Refugee Council – Pushbacks and rights violations at borders
https://drc.ngo/what-we-do/core-sectors/protection/pushback-protecting-rights-at-borders/

Use of violence and coercion

Reports consistently describe physical violence during pushback operations. Migrants and asylum seekers have testified to being:

  • Beaten with batons or kicked by border guards;
  • Threatened with weapons;
  • Subjected to verbal abuse, racial slurs, and intimidation;
  • Detained informally in border areas before being expelled.

These acts often occur outside any official detention framework, making accountability extremely difficult. Medical NGOs and human rights observers have documented injuries consistent with beatings and mistreatment shortly before people were forced back across borders.

🔗 Human Rights Watch – Abuse and violence in pushback practices
https://www.hrw.org/topic/refugees-and-asylum-seekers/pushbacks

🔗 UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights of migrants – findings on violence during pushbacks
https://www.ohchr.org/en/special-procedures/sr-migrants

Theft and destruction of personal belongings

Another common feature of pushbacks is the confiscation or destruction of personal property. People report having:

  • Mobile phones smashed or thrown into rivers or the sea;
  • Money, documents, and backpacks were confiscated.
  • Shoes were removed, forcing them to walk barefoot in harsh terrain.

Phones are frequently destroyed because they contain evidence—photos, GPS data, messages, or videos—that could prove unlawful treatment. The loss of belongings leaves people more vulnerable to exploitation, violence, and exposure after being pushed back.

🔗 Amnesty International – Evidence of theft and destruction during pushbacks
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2021/06/europe-pushbacks/

🔗 Border Violence Monitoring Network – testimonies on confiscation of belongings
https://borderviolence.eu/testimonies/

Abandonment in unsafe or remote areas

Many pushbacks involve deliberate desertion in dangerous locations, including forests, rivers, border zones, or conflict-affected regions. People are often left:

  • At night;
  • Without food, water, or medical care;
  • In areas known for violence, landmines, or extreme weather.

In land pushbacks, individuals may be forced across rivers or through rugged terrain. In maritime contexts, people are sometimes towed back into international waters or placed in unseaworthy boats and abandoned.

🔗 Council of Europe – Pushbacks and collective expulsions
https://www.coe.int/en/web/commissioner/-/pushbacks-are-illegal-and-must-stop

🔗 UNHCR – Concerns over abandonment at borders and at sea
https://www.unhcr.org/news/press-releases

Abandonment at sea and life-threatening maritime pushbacks

At sea, pushbacks can be particularly deadly. Documented practices include:

  • Turning boats back without assessing distress;
  • Removing engines or fuel and abandoning people at sea;
  • Towing vessels into international waters and leaving them adrift.

These actions violate both refugee law and international maritime law, which obliges states to rescue people in distress at sea. NGOs have linked maritime pushbacks to drownings and disappearances in the Mediterranean.

🔗 Alarm Phone – Documentation of maritime pushbacks
https://alarmphone.org/en/

🔗 UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights – Pushbacks at sea
https://www.ohchr.org/en/stories/2023/06/pushbacks-migrants-sea

Scale of the practice: 2024 data

The scale of pushbacks underscores that this is a systemic policy issue, not an exceptional response. According to NGO data compiled in 2024:

  • Over 120,000 illegal pushbacks were recorded at EU borders in that year alone;
  • Bulgaria, Greece, and Hungary were among the countries with the highest reported numbers;
  • Many cases involved repeat pushbacks of the same individuals, trapping people in cycles of abuse.

🔗 NGO coalition report on 2024 pushbacks
https://11.be/en/campaigns/120457-illegal-pushbacks-2024-a-deadly-reality-at-european-borders

🔗 Euronews – NGOs record over 120,000 pushbacks in 2024
https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2025/02/17/eu-borders-recorded-over-120000-migrant-pushbacks-in-2024-says-report-by-ngos

Legal Consequences and Accountability

International and Regional Litigation

States accused of systematic pushbacks (like Greece, Poland, Latvia, and Lithuania) have faced legal challenges in regional human rights courts — including proceedings at the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) — because these actions violate the right to seek asylum and other legal protections.

Human Rights Investigations

International organizations, from UN refugee bodies to NGOs like the Danish Refugee Council, regularly monitor and report on illegal pushbacks, calling for enforcement of international law and accountability for violations.

The Human Impact

Pushbacks don’t just violate legal norms — they have severe human consequences:

  • People have died or suffered serious harm after being abandoned at sea or in dangerous border areas.
  • Asylum seekers are forced back into conflict zones or into countries where their safety is not guaranteed.
  • Children, families, and vulnerable individuals are exposed to extreme violence and humiliation.

These humanitarian impacts explain why many human rights organizations describe pushbacks as a critical abuse of migrants’ rights.

📚 Sources for Further Reading

To learn more from authoritative sources:

📌 In Summary

Illegal pushbacks are border practices that forcibly return asylum seekers and migrants across borders without due process, denying them the chance to seek protection or have their individual cases reviewed. They violate foundational international legal principles like non-refoulement and collective expulsion prohibitions, and they often involve violence, harsh treatment, or abandonment in dangerous conditions. Because of this, illegal pushbacks are considered severe human rights violations and are illegal under international law.