Ministry closing hotels on mainland hosting migrants
The Migration Ministry on Friday announced the closure of eight of the 67 hotels on mainland Greece that have been hosting migrants, saying the remainder would close by the end of the year.
The hotels are chiefly hosting migrants who have been transferred there from overcrowded facilities on the eastern Aegean islands.
However, those migrants are slated to leave over the coming months as part of a plan foreseeing the departure of 11,000 recognized refugees from the state reception system.
Migration Minister Notis Mitarakis said the goal was to reduce overcrowding on the islands and mainland, noting that island camps were significantly decongested in the first quarter while arrivals from Turkey are down 90 percent.
On Thursday, the Vial migrant camp on Chios was put under lockdown after a 35-year-old man from Yemen and a female employee of the facility tested positive for the coronavirus.
