MSF is alarmed by the “particularly worrying” situation for the thousands of refugees stranded and exposed to polar temperatures.
They have lived through war, exile, terror, ostracism; they now have to fight the cold. The situation is “particularly worrying” for the thousands of migrants and refugees stranded in the Greek islands, warns Médecins Sans Frontière (MSF). At issue: the cold wave that has hit Europe since the end of the week, with polar temperatures that decimate the most vulnerable.
7,500 migrants stranded
These people live “in tents in overcrowded camps” on the Greek islands or in the Balkans, where temperatures have dropped to -28 ° C this weekend. MSF castigates “the cynical neglect of the policies of European countries, aggravated by freezing temperatures and a lack of preparation for winter (which) worsened an already unbearable situation for thousands of men and women who came to seek protection in Europe “.
According to MSF, 7,500 migrants are currently stranded in Serbia due to the closure of the Balkan route. In Belgrade, dozens of migrants took refuge in an abandoned warehouse near the station, due to temperatures reaching -15 during the night from Sunday to Monday. These migrants refuse to join the official reception centers for fear of being sent back to the countries through which they entered Serbia (Bulgaria or Macedonia).
Homeless people die too
Of course, they are not the only ones to endure this murderous cold. The wave killed dozens of people in Europe within days, most of them in Poland. On Sunday, ten people froze to death in the country. In some areas, temperatures have dropped below 20 ° C. Ten other people had already died Friday and Saturday in Poland. This cold wave from Scandinavia caused many road accidents as in France, where four Portuguese nationals were killed and twenty injured in a bus accident on Sunday.
In Macedonia, a 68-year-old homeless man was found dead in a district of the capital. In Serbia, the lowest temperature was recorded on Sunday in the town of Sjenica, in the southwest, with -33 ° C; navigation on the Danube and the Sava was interrupted.
In the Czech Republic, the cold snap has killed at least six people since Friday, most of them homeless. Four of them died in the capital Prague, where temperatures dropped to -15 ° C, and two others, including a Slovak, in Brno and Karvina, in the east of the country.
The cold snap started to ease in Western Europe, but it was still cold in Italy on Monday where two new deaths were reported by the press, an 82-year-old man found dead in his home without heating near Brindisi, in the south, and a 78-year-old man who died of a fall due to illness from the cold. Seven people, including five homeless, had died over the weekend in Italy.
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