Click to expand Image Tommy Olsen. © 2021 Daniel Berg Fosseng/TV 2 (Athens) – The arrest of a human rights activist, Tommy Olsen, by Norwegian authorities on March 16, 2026, is based on a groundless extradition request by Greece, Human Rights Watch said today.Olsen, a Norwegian national and the founder of the nongovernmental organization Aegean Boat Report, was arrested at his home in Tromsø under a European Arrest Warrant from Greece. He is being prosecuted by Greek authorities alongside a Greek human rights defender, Panayote Dimitras, of Greek Helsinki Monitor on unfounded charges linked to their peaceful migrant rights activism. “Tommy Olsen’s arrest is the result of Greek authorities misusing the European Arrest Warrant to expand their crackdown on migrant rights defenders to Norway,” said Eva Cossé, senior Europe and Central Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Norwegian authorities should refuse to be a part of targeting rights defenders, release Olsen immediately, and refuse to extradite him on human rights grounds.”Charges against Olsen include forming a criminal organization and facilitating illegal entry. Olsen’s humanitarian work involves documenting human rights violations against migrants and asylum seekers, including illegal pushbacks. The case against Olsen and Dimitras is part of a wider pattern of misuse of the criminal law to harass activists defending the rights of migrants. In January, a Greek court in Lesbos acquitted 24 humanitarian workers of the final charges against them after a seven-year ordeal, during which time some had spent periods in detention for their peaceful activism. The European Parliament described it as the “largest case of criminalization of solidarity in Europe.” Greek authorities recently passed legislation that makes it easier to criminalize civil society organizations involved in aiding migrants and asylum seekers. While extraditions under the European Arrest Warrant from one European Union state to another are largely automatic, the EU Court of Justice has ruled that they can be delayed or halted on human rights grounds if there is a fair trial concern or a risk of abusive detention. In a March 4 report, the Council of Europe Anti-Torture Committee said that detention conditions in male prisons in Greece “continue to fall short of acceptable and legal minimum standards” and that they could amount to inhuman and degrading treatment. The United Nations special rapporteur on human right defenders, Mary Lawlor, expressed deep concern on March 19 about Olsen’s arrest, stating that these charges appear to be “in direct retaliation” for Olsen’s work and form part of a “long-standing and well-documented repression” of rights defenders in Greece.“Greece should be celebrating the life-saving work of Tommy Olsen and others like him not trying to jail him,” Cossé said. “Norwegian authorities should not allow themselves to become a party to this injustice.”