(AFP) Greece said Monday it wanted to start sending back thousands of migrants to Turkey, a day after a deadly fire sparked riots at an overcrowded camp on the island of Lesbos.
The decision, taken at an emergency cabinet meeting, came as officials in Greece and abroad called for action to ease the pressure on the crowded migrant camps spread across the Aegean islands.
Athens wants to return 10,000 migrants to Turkey by the end of 2020, the government statement said. That would increase the rate from the “1,805 returned in the 4.5 years under the previous (left-wing) Syriza government,” it added.
The conservative government of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has already announced more naval patrols in the Aegean, closed centres for migrants refused asylum, and plans to overhaul the asylum system, the statement added.
