An Egyptian fisherman who was facing a 4760-year sentence in a Greek prison has been sentenced to centuries in jail.
H. Elfallah was found guilty this week of ‘smuggling’ nearly 500 people from Libya to Greece in November 2022 — including 336 men, 10 women, 128 boys and nine girls — has ended up with a ‘lesser’ sentence of 280 years instead.
Activist groups have condemned the court’s decision, saying that the fisherman — who was one of the migrants aboard the ship but was also steering the vessel — is being used as a scapegoat by Greek authorities.
The 45-year-old Egyptian fisherman was found aboard the vessel when it arrived in the Crete port of Paleochora at the end of November 2022.
The boat, which had lost control in strong winds near the coast, sent a distress signal to the Greek Coast Guard, which brought the vessel ashore and rescued the people on board.
The dilapidated boat had set sail from Libya with the goal of reaching Italy’s shores, and the smuggled migrants on board were mostly from Syria, Egypt, Pakistan, Sudan and Palestine.
When Greek authorities boarded the boat they immediately arrested seven migrants who had tried to steer the vessel to safety, including Elfallah and his 15-year-old son, according to the human rights NGO borderline-europe.
The charity says Elfallah was not responsible for smuggling the nearly 500 migrants on board the ship, and claim he didn’t want to take over the steering, but was forced to by the dire circumstances of the voyage.
“Elfallah could not afford the cost of several thousand euros for the trip for himself and his son,” the NGO writes. “In exchange for a cheaper price, he and his son agreed to do some chores – something that is very common on the flight route to Europe.”
The Egyptian and his son had reportedly wanted to reunite with another son who is already living in the UK.
