Thursday 14 August 2008

No Border Patras

Greece has long been one of the frontier states of the Fortress Europe war against migrants. It is one of the countries where migrants suffer some of the harshest detention conditions. Medicins Sans Frontiers recently declared a number of humanitarian crises at the detention centres on Lesbos and Mytilini.

Many of the migrants in Greece are refugees from war-torn Afghanistan. In the Greek city of Patras a temporary settlement of migrants, originally set up by Iraqi Kurdish refugees and that has been in existence for about 13 years, is home to around 3000 migrants, mainly Afghans. The settlement has been subjected to constant police harassment for a number of years and is effectively under a state of siege.

In February this year police attempted to dismantle the settlement, causing what the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees also labelled "a humanitarian crisis" when the settlement's 400 children were forced onto the streets of Patras. Most ended up sleeping rough znd having to fend for themselves.

No Border Patras have called for 3 days of actions and events on August 29th - 31st to highlight the situation in Patras. The english language call-out can be found at: No Border Patras.

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