Thousands of people, mostly refugees, were camped out at the main port on Lesbos on Thursday, as the small Greek island struggled to cope with new arrivals making their way to the island by boat from nearby Turkey.
Aid workers on the ground described "overflow and chaos" as people waited for authorities.
Lesbos mayor Spyros Galinos asked the Greek government to declare a state of emergency on the island on Wednesday, estimating that more than 20,000 refugees are currently on the island and that some 10,000 have gathered around the port.
“Over the last two months, the number of migrants that have passed through the island has exceeded its population of 85,000,” he said.
Overflow and chaos at the port in #Lesbos. @theIRC responding. pic.twitter.com/zBzuEY62Cb— Tyler Jump (@TylerJump) September 3, 2015
And the constant influx of people into the country shows no signs of slowing. Alternate Interior Minister Antonis Makrydimitris said Thursday that in July 2014, Greece saw 2,103 migrants arrive, compared to 45,000 in July this year.
He says "that's a 3,000 percent increase." The International Red Cross reported a record number of people arrived on the island this weekend, with 4,000 arriving on Saturday alone.
Makrydimitris says people will continue to flock to the country well into September and October "until conditions change."
He said the vast majority of migrants were reaching five eastern Greek islands: with Lesbos seeing 50 percent of arrivals, followed by Kos with 28 percent. The other hard-hit islands were Chios, Samos and Leros.
Kirk Day, the International Rescue Committee’s Emergency Field Director in Lesbos, described how thousands of refugees slept rough in the middle of the main port on Lesbos, Mytilini on Wednesday night.
He says the aid organization has heard reports that the police have stopped registering refugees as they work to provide for the basic needs of the thousands camped there.
"This could not be happening at a worse possible time. The police at the port are responsible for issuing travel documents to refugees that allow them to travel to the mainland. With thousands desperate to leave Lesbos, any suspension in registrations is likely to result in a rapidly deteriorating situation and subsequent rise in tensions," said Day, in a statement released Wednesday. “The international community needs to wake up and respond urgently to the crisis on Lesbos. The registration process needs to be quicker and more ordered."
Greece's caretaker government says its coast guard has been rescuing hundreds of people from the sea every day — sometimes more than 1,000 in one day — despite scarce resources.
The country has been in the grip of a deep financial crisis for the past five years that has wiped out a quarter of its economy. The country needs an estimated 1 billion euros to deal with the current migrant crisis, according to the country's caretaker economy minister, Nikos Christodoulakis.
He said, for now, Greece is completing procedures to get money from nine different European funds, seeking 400 million euros ($445 million) from the asylum fund and 330 million euros ($367 million) from a fund for the poor.
Some information from the Associated Press.