Greece says it has warded off an organized, massive and illegal border violation by refugees and migrants from Turkey.
“Over 4,000 illegal border crossings have been averted,” government spokesman Stelios Petsas said on Saturday on Greek state television ERT after a crisis session chaired by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
The Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday in Istanbul: “We opened the (border) gates yesterday.” Since Friday, 18,000 refugees have come to the EU across the Turkish border. By Saturday there could be up to 30,000. The EU has not kept its promises, Erdogan criticized. Turkey cannot care for so many refugees.
Turkey has already taken in more than 3.6 million refugees from Syria. A refugee pact with the EU in 2016 actually stipulates that Turkey is preventing refugees and migrants from entering the EU. In return, Ankara receives financial support.
“Zero migration” in Bulgaria
The situation is different in Bulgaria than in Bulgaria, which also has an EU external border with Turkey. “There is zero migration on our border (to Turkey),” Prime Minister Boiko Borissow said on Saturday after a report by the state television.
Border police chief Svetlan Kitschikow confirmed at the largest Bulgarian-Turkish border crossing at Kapitan Andreewo that the situation is no different from that of previous days. Migrants moved from Istanbul to the west, but not towards the Bulgarian border.
In Athens, government spokesman Petsas said: “We stopped and protected our borders, which are also EU borders.” Greece is determined to do everything possible to protect its and thus the EU border.
66 migrants were arrested who had managed to enter Greek territory. Greece is also strengthening its controls off the east Aegean islands with more than 50 Coast Guard and Navy ships, the spokesman said.
Government officials in Athens said the Turkish president was instrumentalizing the millions of refugees and migrants in his country to force the EU to pay him more money so that he could continue his policy and military action in Syria. Greece had nothing to do with the war in Syria and would not pay the price, Prime Minister Mitsotakis had said the previous day.
The situation on the Greek-Turkish border remained tense on Saturday. The Greek riot police used tear gas and stun grenades to prevent large groups of people from crossing the already closed border crossing at Kastanies / Pazarkule. The refugees and migrants hurled stones and a few fire bottles at the police, as Greek TV showed.
Turkish attacks in Idlib
Turkey has killed at least 45 Syrian government soldiers, according to activists, in attacks in the Syrian provinces of Idlib and Aleppo.
Turkey has attacked areas near the cities of Sarakib and Marat al-Numan with fighter planes, drones and artillery, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Saturday. In addition, Turkish troops with surface-to-surface missiles attacked factories and a research facility east of Aleppo.
According to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey had carried out several attacks in Syria. Equipment for the construction of chemical weapons as well as air defense systems and runways were destroyed, Erdogan said in Istanbul. More than 300 military vehicles were destroyed, including more than 90 tanks. The background to the retaliation attacks is the death of numerous Turkish soldiers in Syria.
The Syrian government denied the allegations and accused Erdogan of “misleading” statements and exaggeration. If chemical weapons plants had really been destroyed in Syria, many people would have died in the surrounding area, according to a report by the state Syrian news agency Sana on Saturday.
(Red / SDA / Reuters)
Created: 02-29-2020, 05:35 PM
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