1/3 🟠 BVMN’s May report is now online. borderviolence.eu/reports/bvmn... With contributions from our partner organisations & working groups, this special edition explains how specific groups of people on the move are made vulnerable by the systems that are meant to protect them.

1/3 🟠 BVMN’s April report is now online. borderviolence.eu/reports/bvmn... With contributions from our partner organisations & working groups, this special edition explains how specific groups of people on the move are made vulnerable by the systems that are meant to protect them.

Next episode topic suggestion: "Is the @frontex.bsky.social Consultative Forum still relevant?"

Frontex@frontex.bsky.social · 2mo ago

This World Refugee Day, our Executive Director spoke with UNHCR and the Head of our Fundamental Rights Office. Behind every number, he said, is a human being, and 75 years on, the 1951 Refugee Convention still shapes how we meet people at the border. youtu.be/FECYMQks7os @unhcr.org

For our blog, Magdalena Rassmann writes about the implementation process of the EU Pact in Greece and Bulgaria, and how both countries have excluded civil society from their process of implementing the Pact. borderviolence.eu/blog/a-bad-b...

‘A Bad Beginning Makes a Bad Ending’: The New Pact and the Exclusion of Civil Society

by Magdalena Rassmann, interim coordinator at BVMN. Published on 10 June 2026. Co-published with Collective Aid. Header image: Demonstration against the EU Pact on Migration in Brussels, on 10 April 2...

borderviolence.eu

1/2 🟠 BVMN’s March report is now online. borderviolence.eu/reports/bvmn... With contributions from our partner organisations & working groups, this special edition explains how specific groups of people on the move are made vulnerable by the systems that are meant to protect them.

In our last post on our research on the Turkish-Iranian border in Van, we explore how the weaponisation of the natural landscape and intensified policing have affected everyday life and the livelihoods of the predominantly Kurdish communities of villages near the border in Van.

The natural landscape of Van makes it difficult to cross: Steep mountains, uneven, rocky ground, extreme cold and snow in winter, lack of water in the summer. Human made infrastructures added further obstacles to crossings, causing serious harm to people on the move.

1/8 From the late 2000s to the mid-2010s, the Turkish state built new military outposts, known as kalekol, and new observation towers equipped with surveillance technologies. The satellite images show the emergence of a kalekol in the Çaldıran district between 2010 and 2015.

BVMN and our partners, Van-based organisation Ortakça, have just published a new report on the Turkish-Iranian border in Van province, one of the most dangerous crossing points for people on the move en route to Europe.

1/5 Our research suggests that people on the move are pushed towards “mine-suspected” areas during crossings and Pushbacks.

1/3 This testimony describes a pushback from Croatia to Bosnia on the 16th of October 2023. Nature is weaponized to directly inflict harm against people on the move, while allowing authorities to evade accountability.

1/5 Our research exposes how Croatian authorities change and destroy environments for border surveillance and pushbacks. In addition to the placement of surveillance technology, roads are constructed in forests to allow quick intervention.

1/4 New Report Out Today! The Croatian-Bosnian border has become a site of frequent border deaths, with many drowning in rivers and others going missing in mountainous and forested areas. This is not a coincidence but the result of deliberate weaponization of a hostile borderscape.

How to build a deadly border: Deaths in border rivers remote forests and mountains are not isolated incidents but the result of policies that deliberately weaponize hostile landscapes against people on the move. (1/3)

Our UN Advocacy coordinator Kirsten was representing BVMN at the International Migration Review Forum this year. This is only the second that the Forum is convening - this time at the UN Headquarters in New York.

1/6 Trial observers from Legal Centre Lesvos travelled to Chania, Crete to monitor so-called smuggling trials before the One- and Three-Member Appeals Courts on 4 and 7 May 2026.

📣 Summer intern ad: Interested in critical research on borders, counter-mapping or counter-archiving? #DetentionLandscapes are looking for an intern (**unpaid) with strong writing/ editing/ research skills and ability to work independently. More info 👉 detentionlandscapes.uwazi.io/en/

1/2 BVMN is hiring a Safer Space & Community Facilitators in Sarajevo and Belgrade, starting from June 1st, for a period of 3 months. 20 hours/week. Apply by May 17 by sending your CV and a letter of motivation to ana_fieldco@borderviolence.eu Interviews will take place between 18-22 May.

Tomorrow at 14:30 CET, our UN coordinator will be speaking on how to center gender in migration governance, as part of the Global Gender and Migration Assembly. Register here: us06web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

Presionándolos con los fondos europeos y la promesa de adhesión al bloque, la UE utiliza a los países de los Balcanes Occidentales como laboratorio de su nueva política migratoria de externalización. Lo cuento en @ctxt.es con la colaboración de @borderviolence.bsky.social shorturl.at/zwtf2

Los Balcanes, el patio trasero donde la UE ensaya su política migratoria

Bruselas presiona a los países de la región con los fondos europeos y la promesa de adhesión para que contengan la migración. La estrategia de reforzar fronteras ha erosionado los derechos humanos den...

shorturl.at

1/3 🟠 BVMN’s February report is now online. borderviolence.eu/reports/bvmn... With contributions from our member organisations, partners and working groups, this edition covers, among other things: ❌ New EU Regulation on safe-third countries ❌ Closure of the Ušivak TRC

Frontex's Israeli spy drones keep taking a swim in the Med. This time off Malta. Must be the karma for a a surveillance programme that's burned through €200M+ in EU contracts just to watch people drown. War-economies and forced migration are two sides of the same coin.🧵

Third crash of Israeli Frontex drone, details remain secret – military in Malta claims to have recovered wreckage | Matthias Monroy

Once again, a Frontex drone has crashed into the Mediterranean – this time off Malta. Officially, the authorities speak of an emergency landing due to technical problems. Flights with a twin drone wer...

tinyurl.com

Last month, researcher Dan Schoolar presented findings from his research into border technologies in Serbia as part of the "Invisible Borders" project, funded by the Svenska Postkodlotteriets Stiftelse (Swedish postcode lottery foundation). www.invisibleborders.org

1/3 🟠 BVMN’s January report is now online. borderviolence.eu/reports/bvmn... With contributions from our member organisations, partners and working groups, this edition covers, among other things: ❌Authorities' negligence results in another death in the Lipa TRC

1/2 We are co-organizing a webinar with @11.be on pushbacks and border monitoring on Monday at 10 a.m. CET. Register here: forms.gle/s3obH7CaxYyK...

Webinar on Pushbacks and Monitoring

30th of March, 10 am

forms.gle

In our latest blog post, co-published with @statewatch.bsky.social, Luca Rondi exposes the 'blackmail' at the centre of @frontex.bsky.social's push for 'voluntary' deportations from Europe. The piece was originally written in Italian for Altreconomia.

Immigration detention in Greece is a shady business. In 2024/25, #DetentionLandscapes collaborated with a 3D modelling specialist Boudewyn vD and a team of volunteers to visually recreate 5 immigration detention sites. detentionlandscapes.uwazi.io/en/page/8qm9...

Shedding light on hidden detention sites with #DetentionLandscapes. 1️⃣ Corinth: ➡️built in 2012 on a former military camp, 1hr from Athens ➡️largest immigration detention centre in Greece ➡️detains men who are undocumented/asylum seekers ➡️ criticised for poor conditions, overcrowding, ill-treatment

New blog post from BVMN team member @alraven.bsky.social on the EU's ongoing push to implement US-style mass deportations in Europe, and the #WeKeepUsSafe campaign's effort in opposing it. Cover image design: Elena Milani borderviolence.eu/blog/the-eu-...

1/6 In 2023, BVMN submitted a complaint to the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS), after recording a number of instances in which respondents stated that they were photographed by @frontex.bsky.social officers using personal mobile devices prior to being pushed back.