Ninety-five refugees from the city of Kobani, Syria, who had been unlawfully detained in a sports hall in the Turkish border town of Suruç since 5 October have been released. They must be given access to medical care and an investigation must be carried out into their unlawful detention and allegations of ill-treatment.

At around 4pm on 20 October, 95 refugees from Syria were taken from the sports hall in Suruç, south-eastern Turkey, where they had been unlawfully detained since 5 October, to a tented camp in the Aligör neighborhood in Suruç. After their arrival in the camp, they were released by the Turkish authorities and are believed to have joined their respective families in Turkey. These 95 individuals were the remaining refugees from a group of almost 300 initially detained in the sports hall. Two groups of 82 and 40 refugees were coerced into returning to Syria on 14 and 16 October, respectively, and a third group of around 85 were released to a camp in Turkey.

Lawyers acting on behalf of the refugees told Amnesty International that there has been no response from the authorities to the refugees’ complaints of unlawful detention and ill-treatment, or the return of the two groups of refugees they had made. It is also unclear what medical care has been provided to the refugees following their release from detention. Some of the refugees reported to Amnesty International that they had serious medical conditions and that they had been denied access to medical examinations and medication while in detention.

During the past two weeks there have been multiple reports of refugees arriving from Kobani (also known as Ayn al-Arab) and being denied access to Turkey. There are also reports that injured people have faced excessive and life threatening delays before they were granted access to the country.

The refugees told Amnesty International that two groups that were sent back to Kobani had been coerced into signing the papers and told that they would be detained indefinitely unless they agreed to be returned to Syria. This would amount to constructive refoulement, which is prohibited under international law and Turkey’s domestic law.

The refugees also told that they were not given reasons for their detention and were repeatedly told that they would be released by the Turkish authorities. They said “If we have committed a crime, then take us before a court and let them prove it.” Many of the refugees told Amnesty International that their families did not know that they were in detention. Those whose family members were aware of their detention were not allowed to see them when they arrived at the sports hall.

Refugees told Amnesty International that they were individually interrogated on the third day of their detention, during which time they were ill-treated by gendarmerie officers who put them on the floor and stood on their limbs. Some of them told that when they were questioned as to whether they were members of the Kurdish PYD administration, they were threatened with knives put to their throats and told “We will cut off your heads and throw them into Syria”.

The refugees told Amnesty International that they were civilians, nine were journalists working for the Hawar news agency and had remained in Kobanê to transmit news of the situation there to the outside world. Many men said that they worked as drivers, showing their driver identification cards.

The Amnesty International demanded urgent action for the unlawfully detained refugees, calling on people to send appeals in Turkish or their own language to the Turkish Minister of Interior Efkan Ala, Directorate General of Migration Management Atilla Toros, and to send copies to the Parliamentary Commission on Human Rights before 4 December 2014;

- Calling on the authorities to carry out a prompt, independent and impartial investigation into the refugees’ unlawful detention and allegations of ill-treatment, and of the return of two groups of refugees to Syria;

-  Urging them to ensure that all of the released refugees are given access to medical examinations and receive any necessary medical treatment;

- Urging them to ensure that all refugees coming from Syria are afforded prompt access to Turkey and are not subjected to excessive delay, detention or any other punitive measure for attempting to seek asylum in Turkey.