Fire hits crowded migrant camp

More than 12,000 migrants are in need of emergency shelter on the island of Lesbos, Greece, as fires ripped through an overcrowded refugee camp that had been struggling to manage an outbreak of the novel coronavirus.

New fires on Wednesday night broke out inside the parts of Moria camp that had not burned in a first blaze on Tuesday, forcing migrants to flee the camp with their belongings.

There were no immediate reports of injuries but police said several thousand asylum seekers had fl ed and were still unaccounted for more than 12 hours after the blaze began.

Local media posted videos of what appeared to be lines of migrants with bags and backpacks moving along the road outside the camp.

Shelter will be provided to those left homeless, with tents being fl own in, and some will be housed aboard a ferry and two navy ships, The Associated Press reported. Greece has declared a state of emergency on the island.

The fires have brought renewed calls for the European Union to rethink its migration policy, with critics calling the fire a "political disaster".

Erik Marquardt, a member of the European Parliament, or MEP, with Germany's Green Party, told broadcaster DW that Europe had failed to manage the migration crisis.

"The situation we have there is a big problem, this kind of catastrophe can happen every time," Marquardt said. "We should feel ashamed for that."

Damian Boeselager, another German MEP, told DW it was time for the EU to take action. "How much more suffering is needed to actually make all the national leaders act, to make the European Commission act and to commit to relocating these people away from these camps, away from these horrible situations?"

European authorities have offered assistance, according to the AP news agency, and the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia has said it is willing to take in 1,000 of the homeless, DW reported.

German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas has also called for other EU countries to take in migrants.

"We will not leave Greece alone with this situation－and above all－we will not leave the people in this camp alone," Maas said.

In a post on social media, he said: "What happened in Moria is a human catastrophe. With the European Commission and EU member states, we need to clarify as quickly as possible how we can support Greece. This also involved other willing countries taking in migrants in the EU."

An investigation has been launched by Greek authorities to determine what started the fires after local media reports suggested migrants had done so to protest lockdown measures introduced to contain a novel coronavirus outbreak within the camp. It was reported that 35 camp residents had tested positive for the novel coronavirus on Tuesday.

Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said: "The situation in Moria cannot continue because it constitutes simultaneously a question of public health, humanity and national security."