by Aggelos Skordas
German daily newspaper Die Welt hosts an extensive report on the Greek government’s stance in regards to the European Union-Turkey Refugee Agreement. The report concludes that while Turkey is implementing the agreement, there is a suspicion that Greece is “torpedoing” it. According to information from officials in Berlin, Brussels and European Union border agency Frontex, the Greek government transfers a large sum of refugees seeking asylum from the islands to the mainland, so Turkey is no longer obliged to take them back, and so Athens sends the message to the refugees that anyone who manages to reach the islands through the Aegean, can move to Central European countries.
Specifically, Die Welt quotes internal statistics from the European Commission: “From March 2016 to early January 2018, 62,190 refugees arrived in the Greek islands, of which 27,635 were transferred to the mainland (or 45 per cent of them).” German intelligence experts also criticise the fact that “the Greek authorities are returning to Turkey very few refugees whose asylum applications have been rejected. Due to the many violations of the agreement by the Greek side, the experts conclude, that in this way the motivation of refugees to resort to Europe through the Greek islands can increase the number of refugees”.
According to Die Welt, since the second half of 2017 the number of refugees arriving in the Aegean is significantly increased compared to the corresponding period of 2016. In total, in 2017, approximately 35,000 refugees arrived from Turkey, while last December the number of the refugees transferred to mainland Greece was higher than those who arrived to the Greek islands. The Greek side’s argument was the poor living conditions and the decongestion of refugee camps, the newspaper continues.
Only 1,600 refugees were returned to Turkey in two years
Since the Refugee Agreement with Turkey was signed, Greece returned no more than 1,600 refugees, of which 236 were from Syria, the newspaper underlines. “As a high-level interior ministry spokesman pointed out in the German Parliament the Greeks regularly transfer refugees to the mainland rather than returning them to Turkey, as the refugee agreement provides.”
The newspaper notes that outwardly the German ministry chooses praiseworthy words for the agreement, describing it such as “a common success”, but the newly appointed Deputy Minister of Interior indicates that “not all aspects of the agreement are implemented, such as the [refugees’] return from Greece to Turkey”. Nevertheless, among those pushing the Greek government to implement the agreement is the European Commission which is requesting the accelerated return to Turkey of the refugees’ whose asylum applications have been rejected, Die Welt points out.
