BERLIN – Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis’ fears that tighter border controls in Germany could see refugees coming back to Greece and drive up arrivals has drawn coverage by Germany’s state broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW) that cataloged Greek media stories.

The New Democracy government also is trying to keep out refugees and migrants but is anxious that Germany doing the same would see more landings in Greece, including sending them back to Greece, where they first landed.

DW said that Greece is also concerned that other European Union countries may follow Germany’s lead, although the bloc had already essentially closed its borders to refugees and migrants, dumping the problem largely on Greece, which is holding thousands.

https://www.dw.com/en/greece-worried-about-consequences-of-german-border-checks/a-70320699

A survey by the market research institute Pulse for SKAI TV showed, however, that the problem isn’t high on the list of worries by Greeks and residents, with 34.5 percent focused on the cost of living and high food prices and housing costs.

Mitsotakis earlier said that stricter border controls in Germany amounts to setting aside Europe’s open-border Schengen Zone and put even more of a burden on Greece, a key destination for refugees and migrants since 2015.

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/greek-pm-says-response-migration-cannot-be-scrapping-schengen-zone-2024-09-12/

Germany began the checks on Sept. 16 and said they would last for six months in an attempt to slow unlawful migration into the country with Mitsotakis saying that, “Germany had an extremely tolerant and I would say socially generous policy against migrants which is now triggering a big social backlash.”

He told a Greek radio station in an interview that, “The response cannot be unilaterally scrapping Schengen and dropping the ball to countries which sit on Europe’s external borders,” Greece foremost among them.

He said that the EU Pact on Migration and Asylum, a revamped migration system that recognizes the importance of guarding Europe’s external borders, should be implemented, also added Reuters.

Mitsotakis’ conservative government, which won a second term in 2023, has been trying to keep out refugees and migrants but denied repeated allegations by activists and human rights groups of pushing them back at sea and on land.

Citizen Protection Minister Michalis Chrisochoidis earlier told state broadcaster ERT that, “We are doing our duty to Europe, we’re guarding our borders,” the EU allowing asylum only in the first country in which a refugee or migrant lands.