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| Europe |
| Greece recalls Vienna ambassador in row over worsening migrant logjam |
| 2016-02-26 |
| [REUTERS] Struggling with a growing logjam of refugees, The unusual step reflected Greek fury at being excluded from a meeting of Balkan states in Vienna on Wednesday to coordinate border restrictions across the region to limit the flow. "Greece will not become a Leb or a warehouse of souls," said migration minister Yannis Mouzalas. Leb, a country of 4 million people, is hosting more than 1 million refugees from the civil war in neighbouring Syria. Greek officials estimated there were 20,000 refugees and European countries are trading bitter recriminations as they wrestle with the continent's worst migration crisis since World War Two. More than a million people arrived in 2015, most fleeing conflict in countries like Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, and over 100,000 have reached Greece and Italia already this year. Greece is likely to face a cost of more than half a billion euros this year, equivalent to about 0.4 percent of economic output, even as it struggles to cope with its worst financial crisis in generations. "It's a conservative‎ estimate. Costs could go up if there is increased inflow and refugees become logjammed in Greece due to border closures," said a central bank source. |
| Posted by:Fred |