Greece sends extra police to island struck by migrant crisis
Greek Minister of State Alekos Flabouraris said two riot police units from Athens, as well as a cruise liner with a capacity for at least 2,500 people, would be dispatched to the island to help ease the refugee crisis.
The ship would be converted into a reception centre to process arrivals and would dock in the main port of the island, Flabouraris said.
The deployment came after the island's mayor, Giorgos Kiritsis, warned of "bloodshed" if the situation on the island of 33,000 people -- where around 7000 migrants are waiting to apply for immigration papers -- deteriorated.
On Tuesday, skirmishes erupted at a makeshift reception centre at a sports stadium during which police used fire extinguishers to disperse people.
Hundreds of people, including infants, were still penned at the sports stadium on Wednesday, waiting for papers that would allow them to travel.
Witnesses said those waiting had no food and little water as daytime temperatures soared.
Reports of harassment
Flabouraris said the Greek government was going to do as much as possible to ease the problems facing Kos, even as Athens was dealing with the worst financial crisis in the country’s history.
Tens of thousands of people have crossed into Greece from Turkey on packed boats.
Dozens of tents lined a beachfront promenade leading from Kos’s main port on Wednesday. There have been reports of harassment by private security personnel, medical charity Doctors Without Borders said.
A coastguard spokeswoman said more than 200 migrants had been rescued in the past 24 hours on the island.
A rudimentary processing centre set up in a stadium on Kos was largely empty Thursday morning after police issued temporary travel papers to at least 1,000 men, women and children.
But large numbers of refugees, many from war-devastated Syria, remain camped outside the stadium waiting to register.
(FRANCE 24 with AP, REUTERS)
