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Aid organizations and the Greens continue to demand the admission of refugees. 300 people were housed in a makeshift tent camp.
On the Greek island of Lesbos, the situation remains tense even after the opening of the first replacement accommodation for refugees from the burned-out Moria camp. The Greek government sent more police units and armored all-terrain vehicles to the island on Sunday. More than 300 people were able to move to a temporarily erected tent camp.
Corona’s tests found that seven of them are infected. However, thousands of migrants still live on the streets. Many are desperately resisting being taken back to a camp. Meanwhile, Austria offered Greece immediate help with 400 fully equipped tents for 2,000 people (with heating, beds, blankets, etc.) and hygiene kits. Interior Minister Karl Nehammer (ÖVP) telephoned his counterpart, Migration Minister Notis Mitarakis, who thanked him for his support.
On Sunday, Greek media reported that some migrants prevented others from moving to the newly built camp. This was also confirmed by an employee of an aid organization of the German Press Agency. Greece’s minister for the protection of citizenship, Michalis Chrysohoidis, addressed militant immigrants with a warning: Greece was a constitutional state and not even the smallest illegal action would be accepted. Anyone who prevents others from moving into storage must face the consequences. Defense Minister Klaudia Tanner (ÖVP) also offered the Greek authorities a doctor and ten paramedics from the armed forces for a mission in Lesbos.
NGOs welcome immediate help
Austrian aid organizations welcomed the aid and, above all, the government announced the doubling of the Foreign Disaster Fund (AKF). Caritas, the Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders continue to demand that Austria accept refugees from the burned-out camp in Moria.
The Greens also stressed that they would continue to insist. Health Minister Rudolf Anschober (Greens) said the emergency aid and the AKF surge were “partial successes.” He was convinced “that we too should be part of European solidarity on this issue and we should welcome children,” Anschober said at the ORF press hour on Sunday. Meanwhile, the city of Innsbruck renewed its offer to host 50 refugees from Moria.
Greece is still tough
Greece continues to maintain its strategy of not admitting any refugees to the continent other than unaccompanied minors who have already flown from Moria. On the one hand, this is not foreseen in the refugee pact between the EU and Turkey; Athens also fears riots and fires in other camps if the immigrants from Lesbos are successful in their resistance. The vast majority want to go to the continent and then to Central and Northern Europe.
Many families with thousands of children can be found among the more than 12,000 people who have been made homeless in the Moria refugee camp since the great fire on Wednesday. Many of them depend on the protection of the camp because they no longer have a roof over their heads, nor do they have access to sanitary facilities or running water. According to media reports, an aggressive group of migrants, mainly Afghans, is responsible for riots, fires and threats against other migrants.
Migration Minister Mitarakis (Mitarachi) said on television Sunday that food and sanitation, as well as medical care would be provided at the new camp. Assume that the whole situation will calm down and improve in the next few days. The seven people infected by the crown were taken to a remote part of the camp for isolation.
Baby with corona symptoms
It is not yet clear whether or to what extent the virus was able to spread between people. Before the big fire last Wednesday, 35 migrants tested positive. In the chaos that followed, they could no longer be found. On Saturday, a 20-day-old baby from an Afghan family with corona symptoms arrived at the island’s hospital. Later he was brought to Athens with his mother.
Faced with misery, Pope Francis called on Europe to act. The 83-year-old recalled a visit to Lesbos in Rome in 2016 and his call at the time for a “humane reception of women and men, migrants and refugees, who seek asylum in Europe.”
Meanwhile, the German debate on the admission of refugees continued. SPD President Saskia Esken demanded in the “Bild am Sonntag”: “Germany must lead the way here and can also accept accepting more refugees regardless of the decision of other EU countries.” The announcement by Interior Minister Horst Seehofer (CSU) that 100 to 150 unaccompanied minors will be admitted as a first step is not enough. The leader of the green parliamentary group Katrin Göring-Eckardt said in the same newspaper: “Germany should lead by example, preferably with other Europeans in a coalition of the willing.”
(THAN)
