Macedonian police fired teargas to disperse hundreds of migrants who stormed the border from Greece on Monday as a deeply divided Europe traded barbs over the biggest humanitarian crisis in decades.
As frustrations boiled over at restrictions imposed on people moving through the Balkans, migrants trapped on the Greece-Macedonia border tore down a metal gate in the barbed wire fence.
There were an estimated 22,000 migrants and refugees trapped in Greece – some sleeping rough in central Athens, some in an abandoned airport and at the 2004 Olympic Games venues. Hundreds of tents were pitched in soggy fields on Monday and there were reports that fights had broken out among families over tents, which were in short supply.
Nearly 100 foreign police officers – from countries including Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia and Austria were deployed in Macedonia.
Macedonian Foreign Minister Nikola Poposki said that there was a problem with “shifting in responsibility” and shifting the problem to the next border.
Greece’s migration minister said without any outlet, that figure of trapped migrants could rise as high as 70,000 in coming days.
Greece raced to set up temporary accommodation for a thousands of migrants stranded in the country after Austria and countries along the Balkans migration route imposed restrictions on their borders.
Many of the migrants, fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and North Africa, hope to reach Germany, which last year took in 1.1 million asylum seekers.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, faced the biggest test of her power on Sunday when she defended the country’s open-door policy for migrants. She rejected any limit on the number of refugees that Germany would allow in, despite divisions within the government over the issue.
It is my damn duty to do everything I can so that Europe finds a collective way.Angela Merkel, German Chancellor
In an increasingly shrill debate, Austria’s defence minister suggested Merkel take in all those who were stranded in Greece.
The German chancellor... said that formally there is no upper limit in Germany. Then, I would invite her to take the people, who arrive in Greece now and whom she wants to take care of, directly to Germany.Hans Peter Doskozil, Defence Minister of Austria
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