ATHENS (Reuters) – Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis will discuss the situation in Afghanistan with Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan on Friday, Mitsotakis’ office said as Greece worries over a potential repeat of the 2015 mass arrivals of migrants.
Greece was on the frontline of Europe’s migration crisis in 2015, when nearly a million people fleeing conflict in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan landed on its islands – most of them arriving via Turkey.
Like other European Union member states, it is nervous that the return of the Taliban to power in Afghanistan could trigger a replay of that crisis.
The Greek government has said over the past days that it does not want to become the entry point into the EU for Afghans fleeing the escalating conflict in their homeland, and that its border forces are ready to prevent that.
Mitsotakis and Erdogan will speak over the phone at 1630 GMT, the Greek prime minister’s office said.
Separately, Greece’s defence and civil protection ministers are due to inspect a wall that has been built at the northern border with Turkey at Evros on Friday.
(Reporting by George Georgiopoulos; Editing by Ingrid Melander)
