Greek Migration Minister Notis Mitarakis has declared that there will not be a repeat of the 2015 crisis when migrants used his country as a gateway to Western Europe, now that Afghanistan has fallen to the Taliban.
“We are clearly saying that we will not and cannot be the gateway of Europe for the refugees and migrants who could try to come to the European Union,” Minister Mitarakis said on Tuesday.
“We cannot have millions of people leaving Afghanistan and coming to the European Union… and certainly not through Greece,” he added, according to comments reported by Reuters.
During the height of the migrant crisis in 2015, 856,723 migrants arrived in Greece by sea and 4,807 by land illegally that year, followed by 173,450 by sea and 3,784 by land in 2016, with the vast majority arriving between June 2015 and April 2016, according to UNHCR statistics.
The migrant arrivals took place mostly on islands in the Aegean Sea, which quickly became overwhelmed, resulting in migrants being transferred to the Greek mainland where they often travelled north to the Balkan route on their way to their goal of reaching wealthier and more generous North-Western European Union member states.
In September 2015, the island of Lesbos saw clashes between Afghan and Syrian migrants after the Afghans allegedly claimed Syrians were being given preferential treatment.
Locals were also affected by the violence, with one woman stating: “We are in danger, every day, every minute. We need someone to protect us. They come into our houses. I want to go to work, but I can’t. Our children want to go to school, but they can’t. They have stolen our lives!”
Eventually, most of the migrants in Greece headed for Western Europe, but many became stuck at the border with North Macedonia after it was closed, leading to a crisis in the area around Idomeni.
In March of 2016, desperate asylum seekers, along with far-left activists, attempted to cross into North Macedonia. But inaccurate maps distributed by the activists led to migrants attempting to cross a swollen river, and three died as a result.
During that same month, another incident took place at Idomeni that saw migrants put babies and toddlers on train tracks in an apparent effort to blackmail European authorities to let them pass and travel to Western Europe.
After the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban, many are concerned about a new migrant crisis on the horizon. One humanitarian worker predicted that as many as three million Afghans could set out for Europe in the foreseeable future.