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THOUSANDS IN THE RUN: On Wednesday night, major fires broke out in the Moria refugee camp in Lesbos, Greece. Photo: Petros Giannakouris / AP
The mayors of several of Norway’s largest municipalities believe that it is too little to bring 50 people from the Moria camp to Norway.
On Wednesday, the government announced that it decided to receive 50 people from the Moria refugee camp on Lesbos in Greece. The news came after large fires broke out in the refugee camp on Wednesday night.
Several thousand are said to have fled the camp, which has at least 13,000 residents. 70 to 75 percent of the camp has been destroyed, the mayor of the nearby village, Yiannis Mastroyiannis, told VG.
Norwegian municipalities: Has the capacity to receive more
– Oslo and Norway have the capacity to receive more refugees. Now we must show what kind of country we want to be and how we, as a nation, defend our fellow men. The government must act now in the precarious situation that has arisen, says the mayor of Oslo, Marianne Borgen (SV).
According to representatives of the municipalities of Bergen, Trondheim, Stavanger and Tromsø, these municipalities have the capacity to receive 50 people separately.
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Stavanger Municipality Mayor Kari Nessa Nordtun (Labor Party) tells VG that so far this year they have received around 50 refugees, but that they have the capacity to receive around 110. She thinks it is too small than Norway in total you must collect 50 people.
– We have a good capacity to receive more than what we have agreed and we also want that. It is the government that holds the key to giving us the opportunity to receive more, says Nordtun.
- VG was inside the burning camp on Lesbos on Wednesday morning. Read the report here: Escape the flames
VARIOUS FIRES: Much of the Moria camp was affected by the large fires that began Wednesday night. Photograph: ALKIS KONSTANTINIDIS / X90200
In Trondheim, the municipality also has a good capacity to receive refugees, according to Mayor Rita Ottervik (Labor).
– We have said yes to 155 refugees this year, only 40 have come. We have a good capacity to receive from Moria, also unaccompanied minors that we plan to receive ten this year, Ottervik tells TV 2.
Katrine Nødtvedt, Councilor for Culture, Diversity and Gender Equality at NRK, tells NRK that Bergen is set to host 195 refugees in 2020. So far, 63 people have lived there.
– I cannot understand that they set the limit of 50 people of the Moria camp. We can accept 50 from Moria alone, he says.
– I should receive many more
Kristiansand Municipality Mayor Jan Oddvar Skisland (Labor Party) says the municipality has decided to host 20 refugees from Moria camp.
– I think Norway should accept many more. If it wasn’t a disaster before, at least it is a disaster now. I hope that both my party and the government can contribute to receive more, Skisland tells VG.
– Everyone who follows now sees how dramatic this is, it is a situation that I think is completely unmanageable for the local Lesbos community, says the mayor, who has been to the island of Lesbos several times.
Read also: Aid workers on Lesbos sound the disaster alarm: – No solution, no plan
The Mayor of Bærum Municipality, Lisbeth Hammer Krog (H), tells VG that the municipality wants to contribute and has the capacity to receive.
– We want to participate in the solidarity event and we have a good tradition of saying yes to the requests we receive, Krog writes in an SMS to VG.
GREATER DESTRUCTIONS: This is what it looks like in the Moria camp after the fires in the refugee camp. Photograph: ALKIS KONSTANTINIDIS / X90200
Mayor Gunnar Wilhelmsen (Labor Party) wants the municipality of Tromsø to receive 50 asylum seekers from Greece.
– The situation is completely precarious for the people of Moria, and many of them are children who have lived for several years in a crowded refugee camp. It is a crisis situation, and then we must act, says Wilhelmsen (Labor) in a press release.
KrF: You can’t solve the refugee crisis alone
The SV, MDG and Rødt parties believe that Norway should bring more than 50 people from the Moria camp. Jon Helgheim from Frp believes that it is not okay to bring 50 people to Norway.
KrF parliamentary leader Hans Fredrik Grøvan tells VG that Norway could not solve the refugee crisis alone in any case, and that Norway is prepared to stand up with help to rebuild what was destroyed in the camp.
– The number of Norway now registering to pick up unaccompanied minors and families with children is one of the highest relative to other European countries saying yes to relocation. Norway is also prepared to defend Greece with more emergency aid to rebuild what was destroyed by the fire. We line up like this for the thousands that remain. Regardless of whether we had tripled or quadrupled the number we collected, we couldn’t solve the refugee crisis alone anyway, says Grøvan on KrF to VG.
– We have reached a level where we are among the most welcoming countries and we are also ready to stand up to remedy the specific situation that is developing in Greece, he says.
– Should we accept more?
– At the moment, we have not made any decisions on this, but we will keep well informed about the development. We want to participate in this case, he says.
Prime Minister: I think 50 is correct
On Wednesday morning, Prime Minister Erna Solberg told VG that the government currently has no plans to obtain more of the above:
– Basically, it’s these 50. We think that’s correct. So we believe that Greece should deal with these matters. Other European countries must also participate in this charity event. It may not always be the case that there are some countries that have to do this, Solberg tells VG.
The prime minister has not been available for an interview Wednesday night.
