Asylum Rights Denied, Migrants, Refugees Find Greek Island on the Brink – Balkan Insight

The conservative Greek governments decision to suspend asylum rights followed an order at the end of February from President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in neighbouring Turkey for coast guards and border police to stand down and wave refugees and migrants through, ripping up a 2016 deal with the European Union to keep them inside Turkeys borders.

Refugees and migrants headed in droves to the Greek-Turkish border, only to find the Greek side closed. Thousands are now stuck in no mans land. Many have been pushed back with tear gas, and, reportedly, bullets.

Talks between the EU, Greece and Turkey have yet to break the deadlock.

Under the EU-Turkey deal signed in 2016, Ankara was promised six billion euros in aid to accommodate the refugees it prevented from reaching European soil.

But Erdogan, under pressure at home over heavy Turkish military losses in Syria, has repeatedly accused Europe of failing to fulfill its financial aid commitments, and threatened to open the border to some 3.6 million Syrian refugees inside Turkey and more migrants from elsewhere.

At the east end of the port of Lesbos, beside a locked gate, visitors came to offer support to those held inside. Among the visitors were migrants and refugees from the Moria camp on Lesbos, Europes largest and most notorious migrant camp where some 20,000 are housed in facilities built for 3,000.

They passed food and clothes over the fence. Others had just come to chat. A Greek policeman smoking nearby glanced over from time to time and told them to move along. Some Afghan children played by the fence, seeing how high they could climb. A young boy came dangerously close to the razor wire running along the top of the fence, before someone spotted him and lifted him down.

Detained in the port, Salem, an 18-year-old Syrian from the northwestern city of Idlib, chatted to her two teenage cousins through the fence. On hearing of Erdogans order, Salem, her mother and her two siblings decided to brave the sea crossing to Lesbos.

I want to see my father in Germany, Salem said. The other side of the fence, her cousins Esma and Isra have already spent six months on Lesbos.

The United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, rights bodies and NGOs have condemned the Greek governments suspension of asylum rights. The watchdog Human Rights Watch said the move flagrantly violates international and European law.

Boats pushed back

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Asylum Rights Denied, Migrants, Refugees Find Greek Island on the Brink - Balkan Insight

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