Migration and Asylum Minister Plevris: Migrant flows down by 50%
Migration and Asylum Minister Thanos Plevris highlighted the effectiveness of new legislative measures—credited with a dramatic reduction in migration flows—as well as the importance of protecting Greek and European borders, during a television interview on SKAI.
“In the last four months of last year, we recorded 27,324 sea arrivals from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sudan, Egypt and Syria. This was not a refugee-related issue. This year, during the same period, arrivals dropped to 13,857. That’s a 50% decrease, even though the numbers were the same in July. In other words, we have cut flows in half since the new measures were adopted. It is clear that the new measures had an impact.”
Plevris explained that “based on the composition of the groups arriving, the dominant arrivals now are those who believe they can obtain asylum. Nationalities that know they will be detained upon arrival if they submit an asylum claim have declined.” He added that this shift is the reason the profile of arrivals has changed since the summer.
He also stressed that all individuals entering Greece are immediately informed that if their asylum application is rejected, they will enter a return procedure. He noted, however, that “the next stage—where we still have significant work to do—is increasing returns.”
Regarding the number of migrants currently in the country, the minister stated clearly that “there are 793,000 legal migrants,” emphasizing that the actual number of undocumented migrants does not align with “the exaggerated estimates” often cited.
He also reminded viewers that the legalization process carried out over the past four years resulted in only 28,000 people having their status regularized, demonstrating that “we do not have the numbers people think we do.”
