Greece has announced plans to build a controversial new wall along its 128 mile-long land border with Turkey to keep out illegal immigrants, according to reports from The Telegraph newspaper.
A Greek interior minister, Christos Papoutsis, said the Greek public has reached its limit in taking in illegal immigrants.
“We are absolutely determined on this issue. Greece can’t take it anymore,” he said.
Mr Papoutsis said the wall was necessary after Brussels intervened last year to prevent an immigration crisis by sending in an elite taskforce of border guards to protect the frontier between Greece and Turkey, the EU’s most insecure boundary.
He compared the planned barrier to the 650 mile fence along sections of the United States-Mexico border, a AUD$2.4 billion project built over the past five years with CCTV cameras, radar surveillance, armed patrols and predator drones.
“Co-operation with other EU states is going well. Now we plan to construct a fence to deal with illegal migration,” Mr Papoutsis said.
The first stage, unveiled yesterday, was a proposed 10-foot high, eight mile long trial wall by a weak entry point on the Turkish border, near the Evros river and the town of Orestidada, that was overwhelmed by immigrants last October.
Critics said the planned wall would be viewed as a symbol of widespread opposition, led by France, Germany and Greece, to Turkish EU membership and an emblem of a new Christian-Muslim divide between West and East.
“It is easy to imagine how a permanent structure would quickly symbolise the anti-Turkish camp or give the impression of a fortress Christian Europe that wants to keep Muslims out,” one European diplomat said. “Putting up fences would not be helpful at a time when it is more important to build bridges.”
Arrests of illegal immigrants entering Greece from Turkey increased five-fold, to 31,219, in the first nine months of 2010, the only EU land border to show a rise.
Frontex, the EU’s border agency, has estimated that the Greek-Turkey border is responsible for up to 90 per cent of illegal immigration, mainly from Iraq, Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan.
However, Turkish foreign ministry officials have reacted angrily to the suggestion that illegal immigration is caused by Turkey.
“We are actively fighting against such attempts. Each year thousands of people are caught in Turkey’s territories before passing the border to Greece. This is an international issue and needs international action,” an official said.
