Greece’s relevant migration minister on Monday promised to establish camps for refugees and undocumented migrants that have continued to slip into Greece by the thousands since the beginning of the year, while also dismissing concerns the phenomenon has for the crisis-plagued country’s image as a tourism destination.
“Tourists come for the oddities, just like in India,” Tasia Christodoulopoulou told Proto Thema, while adding: “What will a Syrian do to someone swimming in the sea?”
The long-time leftist cadre had generated a firestorm of criticism earlier in the year when she said migrants were “sunning themselves” in central Athens when asked about groups of mostly Middle Eastern nationals congregating on several Athens’ squares and often sleeping in the rough.
The relevant minister said the government will create camps of containing 2,000 migrants each, while EU funds to feed the foreign nationals will arrive in August, with the Greek armed forces feeding them until then.
Asked if the image of destitute foreign nationals harms Greece’s image as a tourism destination, she provided a rather radical view:
“Tourists know where they are going. In fact, tourists head to where there are oddities. They go to India, where children die on the streets; I haven’t seen the tourism flow ended there; they go to Egypt where people sleep in cemeteries. What will a Syrian do to something swimming in the sea?” was her rhetorical question.