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The Routes Used by Organized Crime to Traffic 'Refugees' Into Europe
[GOV] About a year ago the principal route for the migration into Europe was closed off, thanks largely to the efforts and leadership of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.Until 2015, the largest flow had been across the Mediterranean from Libya and Tunisia to Lampedusa, Malta, Sicily, and the southern coast of the Italian mainland. Migrants had been prevented from crossing the Aegean from Turkey to the Greek Islands — a very short voyage — by the actions of the Turkish coast guard, which would catch and return the boats. But in 2015 Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan decided to change his policy (for reasons that can only be speculated about — we’ve made some informed guesses here), and stopped the interdiction the smugglers’ vessels. The traffickers seized the opportunity, and started carrying hundreds of thousands of migrants from Anatolia to Lesbos and Chios. The rest of the story is familiar: The Greek government ferried the arrivals to the mainland, where they stayed in camps until they could be picked up by buses and taken to the Macedonian border. From there the process was repeated at each successive border — get out of the bus or off the train, walk across the border for the photographers, and get picked up by the next bus or put on the next train. Posted by: Glineter Crineter3844 2017-01-04 |
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