After everyone from We Gaan Ze Halen was interrogated at Athens airport and underwent a corona test, the nine activists were given their passports back. Now they want to take a night ferry from Athens to Lesbos. “We are still going there, even though our plane has been taken,” said a spokesman. On Lesvos, the organization wants to speak to refugees, largely to show the Netherlands how bad things are in the new refugee camp.
The campaign is of a symbolic nature, because without a plane they cannot take refugees with them to the Netherlands. “We want to make the point that an airlift is really necessary, whether with our plane or another. We want to show what is happening there and that the Netherlands must take responsibility for this. ” The group has since been in contact with the Dutch embassy in Greece. He says he cannot help them any further. The Greek authorities have not yet indicated why the organization’s plane was refused at the last minute.
The plane chartered by the We Gaan Ze Halen action group left the Netherlands on Monday morning. Their goal was to collect 189 refugees from the former Moria camp. That camp was destroyed by fire a few weeks ago. The Netherlands decided to receive fifty single children and fifty vulnerable migrants. The action group thinks that is too little. State Secretary Ankie Broekers-Knol (Asylum) rejected the plan on Friday, she said in a letter to the action group.
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