Contentious trial of 24 refugee aid workers to begin on Lesvos

The controversial trial of 24 aid workers who helped dozens of migrants and asylum seekers land safely on the shores of Lesvos at the peak of the refugee crisis is set to begin on the eastern Aegean island on Tuesday.

Slammed by the European Parliament as "the largest case of criminalization of solidarity in Europe," the trial has drawn international attention to Greece's stringent border protection laws.

Among those standing trial on a slew of charges are Sarah Mardini, a Syrian refugee who helped save 19 passengers on the dinghy she and her sister sailed from Turkey to Greece on in 2015, and whose story inspired the Netflix movie "The Swimmers," as well as Irish-German rescue diver Sean Binder. Both were volunteers of the now-defunct NGO Emergency Response Center International (ERCI) at the time of their arrest in February 2018.

The case "effectively...