By TNH Staff September 23, 2019

FILE - In this Wednesday, March 15, 2017 file photo, migrants walk at the Moria refugee detention center on the northeastern Greek island of Lesbos. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis, file)

As he headed to the United States for the United Nations General Assembly Annual opening in New York, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said he would seek international help to deal with surging numbers of refugees and migrants overwhelming detention centers and camps.

Before he left, he headed an emergency meeting of his top staff and is expected to meet on the sidelines of the UN meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose country is the source for refugees and migrants pouring onto Greek islands, with the European Union having closed its borders to them.

Erdogan, irritated with UN soft sanctions over his countrys drilling for energy in Cypriot sovereign waters and unmet conditions from a swap deal that has seen only a relative handful of refugees and migrants return to Turkey where they first went fleeing war and strife in their lands warned he would unleash 5.5 million more if he doesnt get concessions.

With the EU having abandoned the refugees and migrants largely on Greece, as well as Spain and Italy, and other countries reneging on promises to help take some of the overload, it wasnt clear what else could be done to aid Greece.

Mitsotakis, though, reportedly wants the EU to provide additional incentives for Turkey although it hasnt yet fulfilled all the terms of an essentially suspended 2016 swap deal that has seen only a relative handful returned to Turkey.

He said earlier this his government, which took over from the former ruling Radical Left SYRIZA after winning July 7 snap elections, would speed deportations as well as faster processing of asylum applications with most of the more than 75,000 refugees and migrants in Greece including almost 26,000 on islands seeking asylum to prevent being returned.

Mitsotakis meeting with Erdogan his first since becoming premier will also be closely watched for signs of Turkeys intent about the refugees and migrants as well as with Cyprus, with the drilling challenging the legitimate governments licensing of foreign companies.

The meeting before Mitsotakis left, said Kathimerini, focused on how to transfer more refugees and migrants to mainland camps and centers although thats technically a violation of the swap deal but with the pressure building with more arrivals in the summer and now into autumn.

Greece also plans to boost Coast Guard patrols in the Eastern Aegean although that hasnt worked yet to keep more people from risking the perilous journey from Turkey on rickety craft and overcrowded rubber dinghies with scores having drowned over the past few years.

Greece also wants additional aid from the EU and more help from the blocs border patrol Frontex which has already been active in the seas but also unable to do much to keep more people from continuing to come.

Theres special worry about the Moria camp on the island of Lesbos which is housing some 12,000 people in a facility designed for 2500 and officials saying the new recent arrivals couldnt be housed so were sleeping in the open or in makeshift tents.

The rest is here:

Mitsotakis Want's Help With Greece's Refugee, Migrant Crisis - The National Herald