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Greece plans mainland shelters as islands grapple with migrants

15 April 2015, 11:01 CET
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Greece plans mainland shelters as islands grapple with migrants

ECHO - Photo WFP-Rein Skullerud

(ATHENS) - The Greek government on Tuesday said it planned to create shelters on the mainland to deal with an influx of illegal boat migrants arriving on the shores of its islands.

The decision was made at an emergency cabinet meeting chaired by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras. It came after more than 700 migrants and refugees, mainly Syrians and Africans, arrived in Greece between Friday and Tuesday, with the island of Lesbos in the Aegean Sea receiving around 500 of them.

Lesbos is off the western coast of Turkey and is one of the main arrival points for illegal migrants.

The government said in a statement after the meeting that all island arrivals would now be transferred to "reception centres" on the mainland where refugees and economic migrants will be separated.

The Greek authorities will also seek additional buildings and land to set up much-needed centres to accommodate the new arrivals, according to the statement.

"If the flow of migrants continues at this pace, we will have 100,000 arrivals by the end of 2015," Immigration Minister Tasia Christodoulopoulou told Mega television.

Recent good weather has prompted a surge in the number of migrants making the perilous boat trip across the Mediterranean to Europe.

The number of illegal migrants arriving in Greece by sea has tripled in the first three months of 2015, with 10,445 migrants arriving, compared with 2,863 over the same period last year.

Greece's new far-left Syriza government has called for a more flexible and "humane" immigration policy and has vowed to shut down the country's controversial migrant detention centres in favour of open accommodation facilities.

Overcrowding at the detention centres and complaints of police abuse have led to numerous hunger strikes by inmates and one apparent suicide in February.

Greece is one of the key ports of entry into Europe and Athens has in recent years demanded more money from the European Union to handle the influx of asylum seekers from war-torn countries such as Syria and Afghanistan.

The journeys to Europe are dangerous and in numerous cases fatal as poorly equipped and overladen vessels run into bad weather or overturn.


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