Category Archives: Migration

Migration: EU praises Greece as ‘shield’ after Turkey opens border

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Bloc leaders announce financial support as UN questions Athens’ suspension of asylum applications

European Union leaders have given a show of support for Athens, describing Greece as Europe’s “shield” in deterring migrants, despite questions from the UN about breaches of international refugee law.

Four EU leaders met the Greek prime minister, Kyriákos Mitsotákis, at the border town of Orestiada on Tuesday, near where Greek police have been using teargas to deter hundreds of migrants from attempting to cross from Turkey.

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Greek coastguards in altercation with migrant dinghy as Turkey opens border – video report

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Greek coastguards had been filmed pushing away a dinghy with poles and opening fire into water in an effort to block migrants from entering the country. Thousands of people have been trying to enter Greece by land and by sea after Recep Tayyip Erdoğan announced Turkey would no longer stop migrants from crossing into Europe through the Turkish-Greek border

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Four years after Turkey deal, EU no closer to new asylum system

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Distracted leaders have been unable to agree on how to ease the burden on frontline states

It was said to be the moment when the European Union lost its political innocence. Nearly four years ago, in March 2016, EU leaders signed a deal with Turkey aimed at preventing asylum seekers from travelling to Europe.

The pact was “celebrated by people who are dancing on the grave of refugee protection”, said the Europe boss of Amnesty International. But the realpolitik worked: the number of people arriving on the Greek islands from Turkey dropped drastically from a peak of 7,000 a day to a few hundred, although numbers began creeping up again in 2019.

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Child dies off Lesbos in first fatality since Turkey opened border

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Four-year-old dies as crisis sparked by Turkey’s decision to open its borders continues

The first victim of the worsening crisis that has engulfed Greece following Turkey’s abrupt decision to open its borders to thousands of refugees desperate to reach Europe has been confirmed with the death of a child in waters off Lesbos.

Authorities said a four-year-old Syria boy died early on Monday when an inflatable dinghy carrying people from the Turkish coast capsized off the island. “Doctors rushed to save the child but it was too late,” a police source on Lesbos said.

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EU vows to help nationals ‘outside the mainstream’ stay in UK

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Bloc’s first UK ambassador says right to remain for many vulnerable Europeans must be protected

Prisoners and members of the Roma community, along with elderly people and the poorest in society, will be the focus of a new EU push to help Europeans “outside the mainstream” to remain in the UK after Brexit.

There are concerns that thousands of EU nationals will fail to apply to the Home Office to stay because they lack information or the means to see the digital application process through.

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Clashes as thousands gather at Turkish border to enter Greece

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EU border agency Frontex on high alert as Turkish president keeps crossings open

Migrants trying to reach Europe have clashed violently with Greek riot police as Turkey claimed more than 76,000 people were now heading for the EU as a result of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s decision to open the Turkish side of the border.

Officers fired teargas at the migrants, some of whom threw stones and wielded metal bars as they sought to force their way into Greece at the normally quiet crossing in the north-eastern town of Kastanies.

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Erdoğan says border will stay open as Greece tries to repel influx

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Turkish leader claims 18,000 people have crossed into EU but some are met with teargas

Thousands of migrants may be in no man’s land between Turkey and Greece after Ankara opened its western borders, sparking chaotic scenes as Greek troops attempted to prevent refugees from entering Europe en masse.

Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, claimed 18,000 migrants had crossed the border, without immediately providing supporting evidence, but many appear to have been repelled by Greek border patrols firing teargas and stun grenades.

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Refugees arrive on Lesbos as Turkey opens border – video

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Three boats of refugees have landed on Lesbos in the last 24 hours as the island prepares for an influx of people after Turkey announced it was opening its borders. Meanwhile, thousands of people gathered in the Turkish city of Edirne, which borders Bulgaria and Greece

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Jacinda Ardern lashes Scott Morrison for ‘testing’ friendship over deportations to New Zealand

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New Zealand PM says Australia is deporting ‘your people and your problems’ using unfair policies

The New Zealand prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, has lashed Scott Morrison for “testing” the friendship between the two nations, accusing Australia of deporting “your people and your problems” using “unfair” policies.

Ardern took her strongest stance yet opposing Australia’s policy of deporting New Zealand citizens, no matter how long they had spent in Australia, if they had committed a crime.

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Police and protesters clash on Greek islands over new migrant camps

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Teargas used against demonstrators on Lesbos and Chios who want migrants moved to the mainland

Clashes have broken out on the Greek islands of Lesbos and Chios, where residents tried to prevent the arrival of riot police and excavating machines to be used to build new migrant detention camps.

Police fired teargas to disperse the crowds that gathered early on Tuesday to try to prevent officers from disembarking from government-chartered ferries.

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Biloela family may spend months more on Christmas Island waiting on court decision

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Home affairs adviser accused of untruthfulness as Tamil family waits on court to decide if youngest daughter can apply for asylum

The Tamil asylum seeker family from Biloela may have to wait another three months for a decision on whether their youngest Australian-born daughter can have her asylum application assessed, after a court hearing in which a home affairs adviser was accused of untruthfulness.

Tamil asylum seekers Priya and Nades and their Australian-born daughters Kopika and Tharunicaa have been detained on Christmas Island since late last year awaiting the hearing on the processing of a visa application for Tharunicaa.

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‘They wanted a better life’: the young Venezuelans escaping into Brazil alone

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After six years of economic crisis in their neighboring country, Brazilian officials say more and more unaccompanied minors are arriving

Jesús Pérez was 16 when he crossed into Brazil in June, fleeing a life of hunger on the streets of his disintegrating homeland.

In Pacaraima, the Brazilian border town that is the main entry point for fleeing Venezuelans, he told social workers he hoped for a fresh start.

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How the American dream died on the world’s busiest border

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It is a place where worlds converge, a vast melting pot of different peoples, all in search of a better life. Yet the US-Mexico border is also, increasingly, a focal point for human suffering

Milson, from Honduras, sits with his 14-year-old daughter, Loany, on the reedy riverbank beside the bridge connecting Matamoros, in the Mexican state of Tamaulipas, with downtown Brownsville, Texas, across the Rio Grande.

On the far reach – a few yards but another world away – is a vast tent (officially a “soft-sided facility”) erected to cope with the sheer numbers seeking asylum in the US. In a few weeks’ time, on the date stipulated on their “notice to appear” document, the people staying here will have their “credible fear interview” by video link.

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Essex lorry deaths: Vietnam police charge seven over role in trafficking

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Police say one migrant was charged $22,000 before being taken to China, France and then the UK

Police in Vietnam have charged seven people in connection with the deaths of 39 migrants whose bodies were discovered in the back of a lorry in the UK in 2019, authorities said late on Thursday.

The victims, who included two 15-year-old boys, were mostly from two provinces in north-central Vietnam, where poor job prospects, encouragement by authorities, smuggling gangs and environmental issues have fuelled migration.

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UK to close door to non-English speakers and unskilled workers

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Government plans to take ‘full control’ of borders a disaster for economy and jobs, say industry leaders and Labour

Britain is to close its borders to unskilled workers and those who can’t speak English as part of a fundamental overhaul of immigration laws that will end the era of cheap EU labour in factories, warehouses, hotels and restaurants.

Unveiling its Australian-style points system on Wednesday, the government will say it is grasping a unique opportunity to take “full control” of British borders “for the first time in decades” and eliminate the “distortion” caused by EU freedom of movement.

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EU agrees to deploy warships to enforce Libya arms embargo

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Operation to come into force as mission to save migrants and refugees from sea is wound down

The EU has agreed to deploy warships to stop the flow of weapons into Libya, as the bloc wound down a military mission that had once rescued migrants and refugees from drowning in the Mediterranean.

Josep Borrell, the EU’s chief diplomat, announced that 27 foreign ministers had agreed to launch a new operation with naval ships, planes and satellites in order to enforce the UN arms embargo on Libya.

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Greece’s refugee plan is inhumane and doomed to fail. The EU must step in | Apostolis Fotiadis

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The government wants to create massive detention centres, but this is being resisted by locals and refugees alike

Since the start of the year, Greece’s reception system for migrants has imploded. A spike of arrivals over the past few months, caused by Turkey’s police operations removing refugees and asylum seekers from its western coastal cities and sending them back to the regions where they were registered, has pushed the existing accommodation to its limits.

Between September 2019 and January 2020, the Greek government transferred 14,750 people from the islands to the mainland, as 36,000 new arrivals crossed the Aegean to Greece from Turkey. While the system is unable to absorb any more people, efforts to establish additional camps in the mainland and new detention centres on the islands have met strong resistance from local communities.

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Australia’s offshore detention is unlawful, says international criminal court prosecutor

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Treatment of refugees and asylum seekers ‘cruel, inhuman or degrading’, but does not warrant prosecution, ICC office says

Australia’s offshore detention regime is a “cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment” and unlawful under international law, the international criminal court’s prosecutor has said.

But the office of the prosecutor has stopped short of deciding to prosecute the Australian government, saying that while the imprisonment of refugees and asylum seekers formed the basis of a crime against humanity, the violations did not rise to the level to warrant further investigation.

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Matteo Salvini trial for kidnapping authorised by Italian senate

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When he was interior minister, Salvini prevented 177 migrants from disembarking in Italy

Italy’s senate has formally authorised a criminal case against Matteo Salvini, the far-right leader accused of kidnap last year when, as interior minister, he prevented 177 migrants from disembarking from a coast guard ship.

Last December, the Italian court of ministers in Catania, Sicily, ruled that Salvini should be tried for allegedly depriving the asylum seekers on board the Gregoretti coast guard ship of their liberty by refusing to allow them to leave.

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102 migrants try to cross Channel as Storm Ciara approaches

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Dangerous conditions fail to deter record number of people from attempting to enter UK

The approach of Storm Ciara has not deterred 102 people from trying to cross the Channel on Friday.

Five inflatable boats carrying migrants who said they were from Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan and Syria were picked up by Border Force, the Home Office said.

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