Christeen Wrona
Tourists were seen in dramatic footage trying to push a migrant-packed boat away from the shore as they descended on a Greek beach.
A video taken on Saturday shows a small vessel carrying a group of asylum seekers as it attempted to land on Sarakiniko beach in the southern island of Gavdos.
Beach-goers were filmed getting into the water and pushing away the boat with their hands in a bid to stop the illegal migrants, from Libya, from reaching Greek shores.
Bathers then told the migrants not to disembark on the beach and redirected them to the port, according to local media.
The incident comes as the country finds itself tackling a surge in migrant arrivals at its southern borders this year.
Minister of Immigration and Asylum Thanos Plevris said on Monday that authorities were working on removing the migrants from the island, adding that ‘within two or three days everyone will have left’.
Earlier this month, Greece’s parliament passed a law toughening penalties for rejected asylum seekers and speeding up returns to their home countries.
The Mediterranean nation was on the front-line of a 2015-2016 migration crisis when more than a million people fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and Africa crossed into Europe.
Migrant flows have since fallen. But an upswing in arrivals from Libya through the islands of Crete and Gavdos this year prompted the government to temporarily ban processing asylum applications of migrants coming from North Africa.
The law stipulates that undocumented migrants entering Europe’s southernmost point from third countries deemed safe by the EU and not entitled to asylum must return home or be detained for at least 24 months and face fines of up to 10,000 euros.
The legislation marks a further toughening on migration under the conservative government of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
His administration has built a fence at Greece’s northern borders and boosted sea patrols to deter migrants from crossing since it came to power in 2019.
The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said the law risked penalising migrants in need of international protection.
It suggested the introduction of fast-track asylum procedures could allow for the prompt identification of refugees and non-refugees and their respective administrative treatment.
Greece said it returned hundreds of irregular migrants after it suspended asylum requests in July and planned more flights to Pakistan, Bangladesh and Egypt to return migrants this month.
Human rights groups have accused Athens of forcefully turning back asylum-seekers on its sea and land borders.
This year, the European Union border agency said it was reviewing 12 cases of potential human rights violations by Greece.
The country has also been accused of deploying Trump-style hard-line tactics, and has even expanded its notorious ‘Alcatraz’ detention facility as it grapples with what officials call an invasion from illegal migrants from Africa, South Asia and the Middle East.
In Lesbos, Greece –– an hour flight from Athens deep inside the forest, the country is constructing its most ambition detention project yet. The massive Vastria facility is designed to house up to 5,000 migrants in one heavily fortified compound.
The compound is nearly completed but remains shuttered by court challenges – not unlike the ones attempting to rein in Trump’s facilities.
The development represents the physical manifestation of Greece’s Trumpian approach – a network of island detention centers spreading across Chios, Lesbos, Samos and Leros that prioritize deterrence over dignity.
In Greece’s Amygdaleza prison, hundreds of asylum seekers are enduring what the Greek Council of Refugees has dubbed as ‘untenable’ and ‘overcrowded’ living conditions, all playing out behind towering barbed–wire fences.
Migrants are reportedly housed in container units with no electricity or air–conditioning despite extreme heat.
Toilets lack running water, and access to clean drinking water is limited to bathroom taps. Medical services are scarce, food supplies are limited and language barriers persist due to a shortage of interpreters.
Suicide attempts have even taken place here, with several other detainees reportedly in poor health conditions.
Saturday’s incident was not the only of its kind to take place in recent months.
Back in July, dozens of migrants were seen in shocking footage leaping off a boat and running onto a beach in front of tourists.
In one clip, recorded at Diskos beach in the south of Crete, a group of asylum seekers were seen crammed into a small boat as it bobbed near the shoreline.
They were then filmed clambering off the vessel and jumping into the water while tourists and local families sunbathed nearby.
Source: Dailymail.co.uk | Read the Full Story…
