UN AIUTO ALLE GUARDIE DI CONFINE
Several hundred border guards from EU member states are to be sent to Greece's land border with
Turkey to deal with a sudden increase in illegal border crossings.
The deployment is the first undertaken as part of a rapid response mechanism set up in 2007 by
Frontex, the EU's border management agency.
According to Frontex, around 90% of illegal border crossings into EU territory in the first half of this year took place in Greece.
Frontex on Monday (25 October) dispatched a team of experts to assess what is needed on the Greek-Turkish border. Their assessment is to be matched with offers of assistance from EU member states. Border guards from other member states will join Greek border patrols and act under Greek command. They are to be armed and authorised to use force, and will have access to Greek intelligence.
The EU experts are operating out of Frontex's first regional office, opened in the Greek port city of Piraeus on 1 October. This office covers Greece, Cyprus, Italy and Malta. Other regional hubs could be opened if the initiative proves successful.
Greece has become a favoured route for migration – especially from Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and Somalia – after Spain and Italy succeeded, with Frontex assistance, in curbing the numbers of would-be migrants reaching their shores. A recent spike in illegal border crossings prompted the Greek authorities on Sunday (24 October) to request assistance from other member states. Local authorities in Orestiada, a few kilometres from Edirne, Turkey's westernmost city, reported as many as 350 new arrivals per day in recent weeks. At least 44 people have drowned at the border this year, the UN refugee agency, the
UNHCR, says.
Detention centre criticism
Under EU rules, refugees can apply for asylum only in the EU member state in which they arrive, which puts a heavy burden on countries on the EU's frontiers. Refugees apprehended after travelling deeper into the EU can be deported to their country of arrival.
Manfred Nowak, the
United Nations envoy on torture, has criticised the conditions in Greek detention centres as “inhuman and degrading”.
Frontex last month began to use its own funds to charter planes for deportations of illegal migrants to their home countries. On 28 September, 56 Georgian nationals were deported from Warsaw, the seat of Frontex. Several dozen additional flights are planned.
(The European Voice)
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