According
to the local journalist union, far-right militants have been harassing
and threatening media on Lesbos for over a year amid efforts to whip up
xenophobic fervour on the island. Earlier this month local journalist
Anthi Pazianou - an AFP contributor - said she received threats after
writing about a Greek girl who was threatened by far-right militants for
wearing a headscarf. Another Lesbos journalist, Stratis Balaskas of the
state Athens News Agency, said in August he was warned by hardliners to
stop writing about “illegal apes”.
“We’ve been requesting protection since May... but the state does not seem to be listening,” Pazianou told state TV ERT.
Journalists
say local hardliners have also been spreading false reports that new
refugee camps will be built on the island in a bid to stir fear and
anti-migrant sentiment.
Lesbos has been a gateway to the European Union since the start of the bloc’s migration crisis in 2015.
At the height of the influx, some 5,000 migrants and refugees, many from war-torn Syria, landed on the island’s beaches daily.
Lesbos has the highest concentration of migrants and refugees in Greece.
Most arrivals live for months in squalid conditions while waiting for asylum applications to be processed.
“There
is no excuse for the shameful conditions in which thousands of people
remain trapped in limbo while they wait out their asylum claims,” the
International Rescue Committee said Thursday.
“The
sewage system does not work and filthy toilet water reaches the tents
and mattresses where children sleep,” the rights group said.
Lesbos
authorities have resisted calls to create new facilities and the Greek
government warns that emptying the island would threaten an EU deal with
Turkey that has drastically reduced new arrivals.
