Europe

Greece: Police clear more migrant camps near border

Associated Press
Published | Updated

Afghan migrants who live in the Hellenikon refugee and migrant camp of Athens register for asylum on Monday, June 13, 2016. Authorities began registering applications at the site Monday, in a processes expected to last months as more than 50,000 migrants and refugees have been stranded in Greece in the wake of European border closures. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris) (The Associated Press)

Afghan migrants who live in the Hellenikon refugee and migrant camp of Athens register for asylum on Monday, June 13, 2016. Authorities began registering applications at the site Monday, in a processes expected to last months as more than 50,000 migrants and refugees have been stranded in Greece in the wake of European border closures. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris) (The Associated Press)

Police in northern Greece are clearing makeshift migrant camps along the border with Macedonia after creating more shelter space to house stranded refugees and migrants.

Scores of riot police were deployed Monday as more than 400 Syrians and Iraqis were moved from a camp set up around a gas station near the Greek border with Macedonia and moved by bus to a shelter near the northern city of Thessaloniki.

Around 3,000 refugees and migrants remain camped at the border at three different sites, after authorities cleared a huge makeshift camp at Idomeni last month.

More than 50,000 migrants remain stranded in Greece follow European border closures and an agreement reached in March between the European Union and Turkey to deport newly arrived migrants traveling across the Aegean Sea.