Greece’s relevant migration policy minister on Friday referred to an effort at imposing what he called political “authoritarianism” via a “fear-mongering agenda” by the leaders of Hungary and Austria.
“As the government, we will not allow Greece to become a warehouse of souls,” Minister Dimitris Vitsas said, adding that there was nothing kept secret in a recent agreement between Greece, Spain and Germany. Leaders of the three countries came to an understanding recently, namely, that certain categories of asylum seekers trying to reach Germany, or already inside the country, will be returned to the previous two southern Europe countries.
In statements to an Athens radio station, Vitsas said that “if one excludes April, where we had an increase in (refugee/migrant) flows, all of the other months witnessed a major reduction in flows in Evros (the border prefecture) and a reduction – not as noteworthy – in northeast Aegean islands.”
Vitsas also said the Greek government’s goal is to reduce the number of Mideast war refugees and third country migrants on the islands from 17,000 today to 10,000 by the end of September.
