Athens is bringing more and more migrants to the mainland

The situation in the overcrowded registration camps on the Greek islands in the east of the Aegean is improving somewhat. Athens has brought 17,000 migrants to the mainland since the beginning of the year, said the Ministry of Migration in Athens on Sunday. There are currently around 33,000 people in the camps on Lesbos, Chios, Samos, Leros and Kos.

In March more than 42,000 migrants still lived in the camps and the surrounding area. Athens also introduced an accelerated asylum procedure earlier this year. As a result, the number of pending asylum applications fell from 140,000 in January to 100,000 in early July, the Ministry of Migration said.

The conservative government had hired hundreds of new border police officers in the past few months. In addition, the country is building a fence along the border with Turkey. There is sharp control in the straits between the Greek islands and the Turkish Aegean coast. Human rights activists criticize this as a "pushback". Athens responds by declaring that the government is under a constitutional obligation to monitor land and sea borders, which are also EU borders.

Source: Kleine Zeitung