Greek PM at UN Assembly: “Nations must share the burden of migration”

“Nations must share the burden of migration and refugee flows,” Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said addressing the 74th United Nations General Assembly Friday.

Greece has had to handle the burden alone throughout the migration movement of recent years, as the country at the EU borders and the forefront of refugee arrivals by sea, he added.

“We are one of the top four EU members in terms of migrant flows,” Mitsotakis noted, stressing “we have the highest per capita ratio of migrants in Europe.”

He said that Greece respected the human rights of migrants and refugees and would remain committed to them, “but we are reaching the limit of our ability” to deal with this issue, which is a European challenge.

He reiterated his call “for comprehensive solutions and fair sharing of the burden.” As he pointed out, countries that enjoy the Schengen zone benefits cannot refuse to share the burden of migration, “a massive movement of fleeing people that Greece cannot bear alone.”

Mtsotakis expressed support for the EU-Turkey agreement, adding that Turkey needed to do much more and the EU needed to continue providing Turkey to deal with the thousands of refugees it was housing. (full speech here)