Authorities on Lesvos vow to free migrants
Authorities on the island of Lesvos have reportedly pledged to organize the transfer by ferry to Piraeus of hundreds of migrants from an overcrowded reception center on the eastern Aegean island, following harsh criticism of the facility by the United Nations refugee agency. Dozens of unaccompanied minors, who staged a hunger strike in August to protest the center’s cramped and dirty conditions, have since been moved to another facility on the island. Authorities are also said to have removed several mothers with young infants from the center. Activists who have converged on the island to protest the migrants’ fate, and who yesterday briefly scaled the walls of the detention center to stage a protest on the roof, stressed that the daily arrival of dozens of new migrants on the island from neighboring Turkey means that any lull in overcrowding will be temporary.
