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EU grants Greece additional 5.9 mln euros to transport migrants from islands

Xinhua, October 27, 2015 Adjust font size:

The European Union (EU) has awarded 5.9 million euros (about 6.51 U.S. dollars) to Greece to support the country for the transportation of migrants from the Eastern Aegean islands to mainland Greece.

The European Commission, EU's top executive body, said in the latest statement that the additional funding will support Greece in implementing the hotspot concept and the recently agreed relocation schemes.

"It will fully cover, for a period of 4 months, the costs for the transportation by ferry of at least 60,000 persons in need of International protection and other migrants from the Eastern Aegean islands to mainland Greece," the statement said.

How ever, the statement stressed that the additional emergency assistance is strictly limited to persons who have been properly screened, registered and fingerprinted on the islands before their onward transportation to mainland Greece, in order to rule out that EU funding is used for irregular secondary movements.

The emergency assistance will be delivered through the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF), according to the statement.

The EU said it has put aside a total of 51.5 million euros to support migrations through the AMIF in 2015. Endit