Some parts of Europe are finally waking up to the migrant invasion of their countries.
According to the BBC, Greece has begun detaining male migrants arriving from Libya and is no longer processing their asylum claims.
Meanwhile, the government has declared a state of emergency and announced new measures to stop what describes an “invasion” of their southern border.
The Greek island of Crete has become a key entry point to Europe after a 2023 Italy–Libya returns deal redirected trafficking routes away from southern Italy.
Roughly 10,000 migrants arrived on Crete earlier this week, most of them men from North Africa, overwhelming local services and costing taxpayers huge sums of money.
The BBC report provides more details:
In the centre of a sweltering, cavernous hall, rows of men sit in silence with nothing to occupy them but the wait. Signs from an old tourist fair propped up behind them urge visitors to “Explore the Beauty of Nature” with illustrations of coves and beaches in Crete.
But those held in the former Ayia exhibition centre did not come to the Greek island as holidaymakers. They are migrants who risked a journey across the sea from Libya to Europe’s southern tip and were then detained and denied the right to apply for asylum.
From Crete, they are now being moved to closed facilities on the mainland. The right for anyone to request protection, or asylum, is inscribed in EU and international law and in the constitution of Greece itself.
But in a move implemented in haste earlier this month and criticised by human rights lawyers, the government has over-ridden that principle for the next three months at least.
Hellbound and Down 