A group of mostly Syrian women and children migrants staged a hunger strike in the center of Athens to protest delays in reuniting with their family members in other EU countries. The migrants said they intend to continue their strike until their demands are met. Meanwhile, migrant arrivals in Greece are up 200 percent.
Dozens of refugees and migrants staging a hunger strike at Syntagma Square in the center of Athens gave a press conference on Thursday demanding the government reunite them with their families. Groups of mainly Syrian women and children had begun the sit-down protest 24 hours earlier, pitching tents and banners in front of the Greek parliament and demonstrating against delays in reuniting with relatives in Germany and other EU countries.
'We will stay until our demands are met'
"We flee our country, Syria, because of the war going on there, and end up here where we live on the streets with our children, without a roof over our heads," said a spokesperson for the refugees. "We will stay here until our demands are met; we haven't applied for asylum, only to be reunited with our family - this is the least that we want," added the representative.
A male refugee from Syria, Amr Isa, said he was staying alone in Greece, separated from his family. "My wife and my daughter are in Germany but I'm stuck here," said Isa. "I could not go because I only had money for two people.We've been making requests to go to Germany for some months now and I know that my request has been accepted but for some reason, I'm still here - so I'll stay here and hunger strike until they give us answers."
Huge request backlog causing delays in reunification
Many of the hunger-striking refugees claim they have been in Greece for over 12 months and are blaming Greece's much-criticized asylum application processes for their suffering. Applications for asylum, reunification and relocation to other European countries can take many months to be processed due to the huge backlog created by the mass influx of refugees which began in 2015. Around 60,000 refugees and migrants in all, mostly from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, are still stranded in Greece due to border closures in the Balkans that halted their planned onward journey into Central and Western Europe.
Migrant arrivals to Greece up 200 percent
In related developments, Greece's under-fire Migration Minister Giannis Mouzalas has admitted that the country's ongoing migration crisis is becoming increasingly more challenging to handle, with arrivals from Turkey to the country's islands up 200 percent since August, compared to the same period last year. Mouzalas described the recent upsurge in refugee arrivals as a "special phase" in the migration issue, with an estimated 4,000 people arriving on the eastern Aegean islands in October alone.
The situations at massively overcrowded camps on Lesbos and Chios in particular have caused outrage among human rights groups concerned about the worsening winter weather, with hundreds of people sleeping outside without even tents for coverage. Mouzalas said the problem was exacerbated by the low numbers of migrants returning to Turkey from Greece - only 1,360 people since March 2016, when an agreement on returns was implemented.
"We would like to see more returns because that will restore the order of things; but we are also struggling because we are the only country that has four levels of examination of asylum applications, so it takes time," Mouzalas told reporters. He said, however, that he has received assurances from Germany that refugees whose applications have been accepted will eventually travel to Germany, even if there are further delays.