MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 24th March, 2020) The failure of European governments to arrange urgent evacuations from refugee camps in Greece or prevent the spread of the coronavirus in such clustered communities in any other way undermines fundamental human rights, Ramona Lenz, the cultural anthropologist in charge for migration issues at the medico international aid organization, told Sputnik.
The world is ramping up measures to protect communities against COVID-19, championing such strategies as frequent hand-washing and social distancing, but such measures are not easily implementable in refugee camps, which in Greece, for example, are by and large overcrowded far beyond their capacity. Aside from being at risk of becoming hotbeds of infection themselves, such facilities are also at risk of spreading the disease into host populations.
"As far as the fight against COVID-19 is concerned, the people in refugee camps are left to their own devices and to the support of civil society. Instead of trying to straighten out the situation in the camps and shelters through evacuations or other measures, governments in Europe are undermining people's fundamental rights," Lenz said.
So far, the European Union's response with regard to COVID-19 and refugee facilities has mainly included funding. Last week, desperate to get rid of migrants crowding in the Greek camps, the EU offered to pay 2,000 Euros to each to voluntarily return to where they came from. The EU leadership has also pledged 700 million euros to Greece to help it keep back some 35,000 migrants who bulked up on the Greek-Turkish border after Ankara briefly abandoned its commitment of curbing the Europe-bound migrant flow.
As the number of COVID-19 cases continues to grow rapidly in Europe, host communities, some of which generously welcomed migrants at first, are now furious and want them to leave. Some countries, with Greece at the forefront, have mobilized law enforcement and the military to protect their borders from migrants.
According to Lenz, such an attitude toward migration on the part of Europe has to do with the recent rise of right-wing governments and their anti-refugee stances, as well as more mainstream leaders thinking they can reduce right-wing influence by taking anti-refugee measures themselves. Lenz called it "a mistake that becomes all too evident in the days of COVID-19."
While fears are high that overcrowdedness and lack of sanitary amenities could give an impetus to a coronavirus outbreak within refugee camps, responsible international agencies claim that traveling right now can expose migrants to a no lesser threat. Earlier this week, the UN Refugee Agency and the International Organization for Migration said they were taking action to suspend resettlement departures for refugees.
