Minister vows to decongest migrant facilities in Crete within days

Migration Minister Thanos Plevris has vowed to relieve unit connected Crete within three days amid a emergence successful migrant arrivals successful the past fewer weeks.

“Τhe decongestion of the land began yesterday and within two-three days everyone will person left,” the curate told state-run broadcaster ERT, adding that radical will beryllium transferred to structures indicated by the ministry. He did not specify which ones.

The remark made connected Tuesday came arsenic a bid of missteps and deficiency of coordination among ministries left 1,139 migrants stranded in a makeshift installation successful Agia, Hania, some detained there since August 15, according to section officials.

The curate said the migrants that get are placed “under administrative detention oregon regularisation of freedom,” arsenic a arguable determination by the ministry to suspend the submission of asylum requests is successful effect. “These are not accommodation structures, but places of confinement, arsenic these radical are considered prisoners,” Plevris said.

Crete recorded 689 arrivals successful August and caller accrued flows successful the archetypal days of September, peaking successful the two-day play when astir 850 radical arrived, the curate said. The ministry is examining whether the caller emergence is simply a “cyclical phenomenon” oregon whether it is linked “to assertive activities by smuggling rings oregon different instrumentalization purposes.”

In July, the Conservative authorities stopped processing of asylum applications for migrants arriving by oversea from North Africa, citing a crisp summation successful irregular arrivals. It then passed a instrumentality successful aboriginal September toughening penalties for rejected asylum seekers and speeding up returns to their location countries.

Plevris said the July amendment “worked perfectly for two months,” but approaching its expiration (October 11) it “is losing its momentum, arsenic it whitethorn springiness impetus to caller flows.”

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has said the instrumentality risked penalizing migrants successful request of planetary protection. It suggested the instauration of fast-track asylum procedures could let for the punctual recognition of refugees and non-refugees and their respective administrative treatment.

In August, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ordered Greece not to deport eight Sudanese men detained successful Athens aft entering Crete from Libya, raising questions astir the legality of a caller three-month suspension connected asylum applications.