Conditions in the new migrant camp on the Greek island of Lesbos are becoming more difficult as winter approaches. Many still have to wash in the sea or with containers of water in "showers" they have built themselves.
A fire broke outside the Vathy refugee and migrant camp the Greek island of Samos in the early hours of Monday. About 15 tents were reported to have burned down. However, no one was injured, according to information by the migration ministry.
Police have cleared the small community-run PIKPA migrant camp on the Greek island of Lesbos. The facility had been created to provide a safe haven for particularly vulnerable refugees and migrants. The nearly 80 people living at PIKPA will be transferred to the Kara Tepe camp.
Another flight bringing migrants, refugees and asylum seekers from Greece landed in the northern German city of Hanover on Thursday. A total of 66 people will be distributed across Germany, according to the German interior ministry.
A mental health crisis among asylum seekers from the former Moria camp on the Greek island of Lesbos is worsening. InfoMigrants has learned that in the new tent facility, even young children are receiving psychiatric treatment and medication to deal with ongoing trauma.
Oxfam and the Greek Council for Refugees published a press statement on October 20 in which they declared that conditions in the migrant camp on Lesbos, set up after fire destroyed the original Moria camp, “are abysmal” and worse than at the previous camp.
A month ago, on September 12, the Greek government opened a new migrant camp on Lesbos, after Moria was destroyed by fire. The new camp is home to about 10,000. InfoMigrants went to meet some of them last week.
A group of over 160 non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and other humanitarian groups have written an open letter to the Greek authorities to reverse a decision to close two reception centers for migrants and refugees on the island of Lesbos.
A group of refugee activists is planning to fly an empty plane to the Greek island of Lesbos to try to pick up nearly 200 migrants. The group wants to bring the migrants to the Netherlands.
The German interior ministry announced on Wednesday that a total of 139 migrants had been flown in to Hanover aiport from Greece. The flight included 51 unaccompanied minors, residents of Moria before the fire, and 88 people comprising 17 children with medical needs and their immediate families.
About 700 refugees are to be moved from the Aegean island of Lesbos to the Greek mainland on Monday. The move comes roughly three weeks after the complete destruction of the Moria camp during a fire.
Greece announced on Sunday that it had its first coronavirus death in a migrant camp located near Athens. Refugee and migrant aid groups have been criticizing the country’s containment policy since the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis.