(AFP) In the thick of the coronavirus lockdown in Cyprus, authorities gave a group of asylum seekers a stark choice: move to an overcrowded camp or go home.
The Mediterranean island deemed it a necessary step to save money — the tiny country of just one million people now has Europe’s highest per capita rate of asylum applications.
For the migrants, it was tough, said one Nigerian, who now lives in a cluster of UN tents and prefabricated huts surrounded by razor wire, a facility built for 200 people that now houses some 800.
He was one of the dozens of asylum seekers who had initially been housed at hotel apartments in the coastal resort of Ayia Napa, which was otherwise deserted because of the pandemic.
