ATHENS:
Greece’s migration minister on Friday said the coming of winter was a “good
season” that should slow the refugee wave and allow the beleaguered nation to
organise its resources.
Greece needed the time to ready itself “in
case we have renewed migration flows from springtime onwards,” he said. The
latest UN refugee agency figures show that nearly 400,000 people fleeing war
and poverty have reached Greece from neighbouring Turkey this year. Most are
from Syria but there are also Afghans, Pakistanis, Iranians and other
nationalities.
But crossing the Aegean Sea this time of
year in inflatable dinghies can be perilous. With winds frequently exceeding 40
kilometres (25 miles) an hour, more than 100 migrants including several
children have died or gone missing in the last two weeks alone in at least
seven boat accidents, according to Greek figures.
In the summer, when the refugee wave first
began to spike, Greece was criticised by the UN and rights groups for leaving
entire families stranded on eastern Aegean islands for days, without food,
shelter and access to sanitation. The authorities subsequently chartered
ferries to swiftly bring the migrants to the mainland, from where they make
their way north towards other EU states.
A reception camp opened in Athens in August
but with over 2,000 people arriving from the islands on a daily basis, more
facilities are urgently needed. Authorities on Thursday moved about a thousand
mainly Afghan refugees who were sleeping on the streets to a former Olympic
sports hall in western Athens.
There are also plans to utilise an empty
army camp on the city’s northwestern outskirts. “We have promised to ease the
burden placed on communities by the enormous refugee flow,” Mouzalas said on
Friday. “We are creating a network (of facilities) to reduce the pressure
wherever it builds up,” he said.
Πηγή: nst.com.my
Δεν υπάρχουν σχόλια:
Δημοσίευση σχολίου