Deadly camp fire: Greece to return 10,000 migrants to Turkey

MORIA, Greece: Greece said it wanted to start sending back thousands of migrants to Turkey on Monday, after a deadly fire sparked riots at an overcrowded camp on the island of Lesbos.

The decision, taken at an emergency cabinet meeting, came as officials in Greece and abroad called for action to ease the pressure on the crowded migrant camps spread across the Aegean islands.

Athens wants to return 10,000 migrants to Turkey by the end of 2020, the government statement said. That would increase the rate from the "1,805 returned in the 4.5 years under the previous (left-wing) Syriza government", it added.

The conservative government of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has already announced more naval patrols in the Aegean, closed centres for migrants refused asylum, and plans to overhaul the asylum system, the statement added.

Greek officials also confirmed the death of a woman in Sunday´s blaze at Moria, Europe´s largest migrant camp, which has facilities for 3,000 people but houses around 13,000. Greek media reported that a burnt blanket possibly containing the charred remains of a baby had been found next to the woman. Earlier police sources said a mother and her child had died.

Another 17 injured migrants, including two children, were transferred to a hospital on the island at Mytilene, the health ministry said on Monday. "Many refugees are so sad, they are stressed, they fear an accident can happen again," Farid, a young Afghan who did not give his last name, told AFP.

A steady increase in migrant arrivals has created dangerous conditions in the Greek island camps in the Aegean Sea, just off the Turkish coast. Boris Cheshirkov, the UN refugee agency´s (UNHCR) spokesman in Greece, called for better conditions at Moria and faster transfers of migrants off the island, describing the situation as "critical".

Lesbos mayor Stratos Kytelis also called for the pressure on the islands to be eased. Aid agency Oxfam argued that Sunday´s fatal fire was a consequence of the EU´s migration policy.

"People arriving in Greece should be relocated to safe accommodation across the EU, not crammed into dangerous spaces where their life is at risk," said Renata Rendon, Oxfam´s head of mission in Greece.

And European Commission spokesman Mina Andreeva said on Monday: "The increased arrivals in Greece over the past weeks have put an immense strain on an already flawed system and are creating unsustainable conditions as we have already had the opportunity to point out in the past."