The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, have released the latest figures concerning the arrivals of migrants and refugees to Greece via the Aegean islands for the period 20 – 26 January 2020.
Arrivals
This week, 754 people arrived on the Aegean islands, an increase from last week’s 577 arrivals and from last year’s 473 arrivals during the same period.
The average daily arrivals on all islands this week equalled 108, compared to 82 in the previous week.
Present Population on the Islands
Some 41,500 refugees and asylum-seekers reside on the Aegean islands. The majority of the population on the Aegean islands are from Afghanistan (49%), Syria (19%) and Somalia (6%).
Women account for 22% of the population, and children for 33% of whom more than 6 out of 10 are younger than 12 years old.
Approximately 14% of the children are unaccompanied or separated, mainly from Afghanistan.
Entry Points by Sea
Lesvos received the highest number of arrivals (423), followed by Samos (208), the Dodecanese Islands (75) and Chios with (48) people.
This week, 736 asylum-seekers departed, once authorised by the authorities, from the Aegean islands to the mainland. Of those, 387 were transferred by the Government with the support of UNHCR to open reception facilities/sites and to ESTIA apartments currently managed by UNHCR that are to be handed over to the Government.
A.C.
