Thousands flee fire at migrant camp
In quarantine amid outbreak on Greek island
A massive fire destroyed Europe’s largest camp for asylum seekers on the Greek island of Lesbos on Wednesday, leaving 12,500 migrants who were supposed to be under coronavirus quarantine with no obvious place to go.
While helicopters doused the final embers, authorities were trying to figure out any connection between the blaze and frustrations over the erupting coronavirus outbreak at the camp.
Three eyewitnesses said the fire was started as a protest against new mandatory quarantine measures, and a semi-official Greek news agency said the blaze broke out after migrants who had tested positive, or had been potentially exposed, refused to go into isolation. A government spokesman told ERT, a Greek public broadcaster, that arson as well as other potential causes were being investigated.
Video showed people fleeing the camp overnight, as the camp’s tents and shipping containers were engulfed in flames. Some migrants were met by police trying to keep them closer to the camp.
The fire sets off the largest emergency to date at a camp that has long been the symbol of Europe’s failure to safely manage and care for people arriving on the continent. Well before the pandemic, the camp, known as Moria, was a site for protests, fatal fires and chronic sickness. It was filled many times beyond capacity and was cited by international aid groups as unsafe and inhumane. It continued to operate only because Greece — and Europe — were unable to find alternatives.
“Events in Moria last night are unthinkable but, tragically, predictable as the dire situation on the islands has gone on for far too long,” said Dimitra Kalogeropoulou, the Greece country director for the International Rescue Committee. Kalogeropoulou said the residents appeared to have fled but are “now left with nothing.”
The pressures on asylum seekers at the camp built further last week when officials detected the first positive coronavirus case. A subsequent testing campaign detected another 35 positive cases, and the camp was under lockdown.
The current Greek government took power last year with a blueprint for closing Moria and other island centres and creating more permanent structures. But it has faced local resistance in places that might host them.
Greece has instead slowly transferred some asylum seekers to the mainland, while a handful of other European Union countries have agreed to take in some of the most vulnerable migrants, especially unaccompanied children. Moria’s population was closer to 20,000 at the beginning of the pandemic.
Greece declared a state of emergency on the island.