Refugees

The hotspots on the Greek islands of Lesvos, Chios, Samos, Kos and Leros are struggling to manage an increase in the number of refugees and migrants crossing the Aegean Sea from Turkey in recent months. Between January and August 2019,…

Gemma Bird, University of Liverpool for The Conversation The hotspots on the Greek islands of Lesvos, Chios, Samos, Kos and Leros are struggling to manage an increase in the number of refugees and migrants crossing the Aegean Sea from Turkey…

In July of this year New Democracy came to power in Greece with a promise to crack down on immigration and the networks of solidarity surrounding refugees. In the last few weeks they have started to put this process into…

Men between the ages of 18 and 39 are often assumed to be the most likely to survive troubling conditions in refugee reception centres. Drawing on recent research on the Greek island of Samos, Gemma Bird highlights that this is now always…

There is an island in the South Aegean Sea that, until a few years ago, was known only as a tourist destination, then it was the ‘Hotspot’ or Refugee Reception Centre that got ignored, and then, of late, the media…

A group of associations took the French state to court over its failure to provide basic services for refugees in Dunkirk and won,  the group Help Refugees  announces in its Facebook page. As a result of months of work from La Cimade, the…

Following openDemocracy revelations, a new EU-funded study reveals a sharp rise in cases of criminalised solidarity and humanitarian aid under anti-smuggling laws. By  Claudia Torrisi for openDemocracy European institutions must consider legal action against member states that incorrectly ‘criminalise’ citizens…

German Boat Captain Faces 20 Years in Prison For Saving Refugees. We have only followed international law, especially the law of the sea, where the highest priority is to save people from distress.” by Eoin Higgins, staff writer For Common Dreams…

(This is the translation of a story originally published by Greek national daily Efimerida twn Syntaktwn (EFSYN) on 17 March 2019) In May and June of 2016, the European Asylum Support Office (EASO) carried out a survey in Turkey for…

Geographical and historical reasons make Italy the Mediterranean’s centre of gravity. The country has been the meeting point for civilisations – both past and present – that border Mare Nostrum.  Those same reasons mean that Italy is today a natural…