Athens – The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) on Thursday said that the number of migrants and refugees arriving on Greek islands had declined sharply.
The bloc in a statement said that since Nov.22, only 155 people arrived on Kalymnos, Megisti, Lesbos, Chios and Kos islands as against an average of 4,500 people who arrived daily in early November.
The agency attributed the drop to deteriorating weather, which made the already dangerous journey on small boats even more perilous as at least 585 people had drowned trying to cross the Aegean Sea since January .
Meanwhile, several people, mostly Iranians, Bangladeshis and Pakistanis, were stranded in an overcrowded makeshift camp on the Greek side of the border with Macedonia.
The situation there had steadily deteriorated after Macedonia previously allowed access to refugees from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.
Macedonia decided to stop the so-called economic migrants after similar measures by Slovenia, Croatia and Serbia.
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In the same development, The EU and Turkey would hold a top-level conference on Nov.29 to discuss tighter cooperation aimed at reducing the flow of migrants toward Western Europe (dpa/NAN)
