In Kastanies, on the Greek-Turkish border, Friday, March 6, in the morning, the tension increased again. Clouds of tear gas covered the buffer zone, sounds of stun grenades sounded, and hundreds of migrants massed at the border post last week shouted, “Open the borders!” ” (” Open borders “).
Greek government
A few hours later, the Greek government accused the Turkish police of supplying the refugees with tear gas canisters and tools to cut the fences that separate them from Greece. Since the announcement by Turkey, on February 28, that the way to Europe was open, Athens and Ankara clash on the field of communication, where fake news is challenging to foil, access to no man’s land being banned from journalists and aid workers.
Turkish government
The Turkish government notably accuses Greek police of using live ammunition against migrants, and of killing three people. If Athens has denied, concerns are growing on the side of human rights defenders, who oppose the suspension, for a month, of all asylum applications and the forced returns of migrants to Turkey. They also note that many of them have been violently returned to Turkey, robbed of their property, and beaten by the Greek police or by militias of Greek citizens who have decided to participate in defense of their country’s borders.
Greek Prime Minister
In a letter sent Friday to the Greek Prime Minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, to the Presidents of the European Parliament and the European Council, David Sassoli and Charles Michel, and the President of the Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, Médecins du Monde and 65 other NGOs denounce “How the Greek authorities and the European Union manage the new arrivals and the extreme behavior observed on the part of the security forces against refugees and the part of citizens against members of humanitarian organizations.”
“Racist crimes.”
Since the start of the crisis, Athens has doubled police reinforcements at the Greek-Turkish border, deployed the army, and called on the European border agency Frontex, which will send a hundred additional guards from Monday. According to Devon Cone, of the NGO Refugees International, the 700 million euros proposed Tuesday, March 3, by the European Commission to Greece should be allocated “to the improvement of reception centers (…) and not in the application of violent security measures to keep asylum seekers at bay”.
Invasion by Ankara
The opposition also casts doubts on the vocabulary used by the government, which speaks of “orchestrated invasion by Ankara.” For the radical left Syriza MEP Stelios Kouloglou, “in Evros, the Republic is being shot down, we are not threatened by the refugees, but by the paralysis of the leaders of the European Union and by the extreme right.”
Villages of Evros
In the villages of Evros, the inhabitants have decided to organize themselves for self-defense, they patrol day and night by the river, hunting rifle on their backs, and denounce to the police those who try to cross. An alarming situation for Epaminondas Farmakis, director of HumanRights360, “Racist crimes and xenophobia have increased in recent months. The authorities should avoid violence and intimidation against refugees at all costs… This is not the case!”
Pulse Institute
But according to a survey by the Pulse Institute for the Greek private television channel Skai, 76% of those questioned support the measures taken by the government to guard the borders in Evros. “Since 2016, the policy of confining refugees in Greece has proven that it has limits,” said Filippa Chatzistavrou, associate professor of political science at the University of Athens. The Greek population is tired and radicalized. “