An event by de:criminalize in cooperation with Sudan Uprising Germany and Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung
Across Greece, more than 300 people from Sudan — most of them aged between 15 and 21 — are currently imprisoned. Some have already been sentenced, while others remain in pre-trial detention. They face decades or even life in prison. Their alleged “crime”? Steering a boat or taking on basic tasks during their own journey to safety.
The experiences of these young Sudanese people reveal a continuum of neocolonial violence: barely adults, they fled a brutal war fueled by imperialist and geopolitical interests. They survived torture and abuse in Libya’s EU-funded detention system, only to be criminalized and imprisoned in Europe for facilitating their own and others’ arrival and survival.
In response to this injustice, several groups joined forces to launch the #FreeTheBoys campaign, demanding the release of all imprisoned individuals and an end to the systemic criminalization of people on the move. As part of this effort, we organized an event on 14 November 2025 at Viertel Welt in Berlin, where we examined the situation of Sudanese war refugees imprisoned in Greece, the ongoing war in Sudan, the use of European smuggling laws to justify mass incarceration, and the colonial continuities underpinning these practices.
The audience heard directly from the imprisoned boys through video and audio messages, followed by a panel discussion featuring Mustafa Ahmed & Eirini Tsilafaki (50outofmany & Mataris Sudan Solidarity Committee Athens), Ibrahim Izzeldeen (Sudan Uprising Germany), and Julia Winkler (de:criminalize). The panel was moderated by Hanaa Hakiki from the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR).
After the discussion, participants took part in a letter-writing session, sending messages of solidarity directly to the imprisoned boys. Together we ate Sudanese food, prepared by SudanUprisingGermany.
