COVID-19 escalates the refugee crisis on the Greek islands

On February 29, 2020, the Turkish government announced the opening of its borders with Greece.

4 million Syrian refugees ready to go to Europe. By March 1, 2020, the European Agency for the Protection of Foreign Frontiers «Frontex» confirmed the arrival of more than 13 thousand refugees to Greece, which refuses to receive them for what it suffers From economic crises, accordingly, refugees are crowded on the borders or inside the camps in the region without clear medical care or even subjecting them to virus detection devices, given their entry from the illegal outlets.

The migrants exposed unsanitary conditions, as the Greek Minister of Health, Vassilis Kikilias, decided on Wednesday 11 March 2020 to close schools and universities for a period of two weeks, due to the increase number of cases infected with Coronavirus in the country to 89 statuses.

Greek fears of the virus spreading quickly between the stranded, and then its transmission to security personnel and citizens, increase as the new arrivals have not undergone the necessary medical examination, and the circumstances surrounding them may stimulate the spread of viruses in general.

On March 9, 2020, the Greek Ministry of Health announced that a woman from the island of Lesbos – the most visited geographical spot for refugees – had been infected with the Corona virus, which increased the government’s fear of increasing infections in the region, difficulty in controlling the disease, and exacerbating negative effects on the coastal region, which is one of the most important sources of national income for Greece.

DW website stated on March 10, 2020 that the UNHCR in Greece began preparing awareness sessions for immigrants on personal care methods that enable them to overcome the spreading viruses, in addition to ensuring that medical teams are set up to receive Syrians to detect them and reduce infection as much as possible. .

Greece is also preparing an emergency construction for the construction of a closed refugee building on the island of Lesbos as an alternative to the “Moria” camp, in which thousands of migrants live in difficult and deteriorating health conditions that could contribute to the increase in the spread of diseases. The Greek government spokesman, Stelios Pitsas, said that the construction of a compact center Migrants will enable the authorities to control epidemics rather than open camps.

On the worsening negative effects of the current border conditions between Greece and Turkey, Abd al-Latif Darwish, a professor of economics and crisis management at the American University of Seattle, says that if Athens allows hundreds of thousands of people to enter its lands, it will become a global security-failing country, stressing that Turkey is promoting the slogans of humanity towards migrants. Blackmailing Greece and the European Union countries is nothing more than that; stressing that the refugees are not only Syrians but the majority from other countries that do not suffer wars, they are only a pressure card.

The researcher pointed out that Ankara does not care much about the fate of the deteriorating refugees or others, but only wants political and economic gain through them, stressing that the major countries are manipulating the interests of Syria; therefore, they are responsible only for the crisis and not Greece, which has nothing to do with it.