HUNDREDS of migrants have been coralled in scorching temperatures in a makeshift reception centre at a sports stadium on the Greek island of Kos.
Hundreds of refugees, including infants, were yesterday still inside the stadium, waiting for papers that would allow them to travel. Witnesses said those waiting had no food and little water. Meanwhile, Greece has increased security on the island. Two riot police units were dispatched to Kos from Athens and police reinforcements from nearby islands were also drafted in.
On Wednesday, Greek Minister of State, Alekos Flabouraris, said a ship with a capacity for at least 2,500 people would be dispatched to the holiday island. On Wednesday, skirmishes erupted at the makeshift reception centre at the sports stadium.
Riot police beat migrants with truncheons and used fire extinguishing spray and tear gas to disperse people. Scuffles broke out outside one of two closed gates of the compound between a small group attempting entry and riot police.
Police threw a tear gas canister to disperse one group of about 40 people and also violently pushed migrants to keep them in a tightly packed queue outside a processing office. Doctors Without Borders spokewoman Julia Kourafa is inside the sports stadium.
She said: ‘The thing is that no food has been provided to the people inside. We sent our team there, so they are actually provided some medical help and water for the people. But they had to stay in the sun, in the heat. And there was only one or two water taps for all these people. And they have been provided with no water, and there was not enough shade.’
Asked why are they locked inside, she continued: ‘Well, the idea was that the local authorities and the police – they decided to just sweep operations and to push all the people who had been staying in the public parks and squares around the city of Kos and to put them inside the stadium, telling them that they would get their papers.
‘So these people, they went there in hope of getting their papers. But the procedure is very slow at the moment, so there had been tension outside the stadium, with the refugees protesting about the fact that they had to stay in very squalid conditions all around the city. And so then the police decided, you know, that there was a lot of tension, so they closed the people inside the stadium.’
