Greek police fired tear gas to repel hundreds of stone-throwing migrants who tried to force their way across the border from Turkey on Sunday, with thousands more behind them after Ankara relaxed curbs on their movement.
The Greek government called the confrontations a threat to national security. “Do not attempt to enter Greece illegally – you will be turned back,” Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Twitter after a security meeting on the situation.
It was the second straight day of clashes at the border crossing near the northeastern Greek town of Kastanies.
A group of migrants lands on the Greek side of the Meric (Evros) River after using a small boat to cross it, at the Turkish-Greek border, in Edirne, Turkey, 01 March 2020. EPA-EFE/SEDAT SUNA
Some migrants have attempted swimming to Greece after Turkey officially opened its western border with Europe.
At least 13,000 refugees and migrants have massed behind a wired fence on the Turkey-Greece border and hundreds of others have reached three Greek islands by boat.
After being told they would be able to enter Europe this week, some migrants were spotted trying to reach Greece by swimming across the Evros river.
Refugees walk in a highway heading to the Turkish-Greek border and trying to enter Europe, in Edirne, Turkey, 01 March 2020. The Turkish government announced its decision to no longer stop refugees from reaching Europe, after 33 Turkish soldiers were killed in Idlib, Syria on 27 February. EPA-EFE/DIMITRIS TOSIDIS
But Greek police have been trying to hold back those wanting to enter, reinforcing its side of the border and firing tear gas to repel hundreds of stone-throwing migrants who attempted to force their way across, witnesses said.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s decision to to ease border restrictions came amid a military escalation in Syria’s northwest that has led to growing direct clashes between Turkish and Syrian forces.
On Sunday, the UN’s International Organisation for Migration said that its staff “had observed at least 13,000 people gathered at the formal border crossing points at Pazarkule and Ipsala and multiple informal border crossings, in groups of between several dozen and more than 3,000”.
The EU, its relations with Turkey tense over President Tayyip Erdogan’s crackdown on dissent and hydrocarbon drilling off Cyprus, scrambled to respond to the new migrant crisis.
Officials at EU headquarters in Brussels called for emergency meetings of migration and foreign ministers to decide next steps, while EU border agency Frontex said it was in talks with Greece to help it guard the bloc’s external frontier.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel had a phone call with Boyko Borissov, the prime minister of Bulgaria, which also shares a border with Turkey, and agreed for the need for talks with Ankara, a German government spokesman said.
