21.00: After the strong demonstration this morning, there were several smaller protests and marches during the whole day inside the camp.
The announced Frontex officers have not arrived yet. They will have a spot right in the center of the complex.
After the police has increased security measures yesterday, now also some NGOs and volunteer groups are joining this discursive construction of a „danger zone“ in Idomeni by publishing travel warnings in social media.
When we left the camp around 30 coaches were waiting in front of the camp, bringing new people from the islands.
19.00: Solidarity initiatives held a demonstration tonight in Thessaloniki to support the protesting migrants stuck at Idomeni. More than 1000 participants were counted.
15.00: There were two more demonstrations. We have the impression, that there are more people in the camp today then in the days before. Furthermore, we were told, that FRONTEX will arrive in Eidomeni soon.
12.00: This morning, a strong and peaceful demonstration took place. Members of all blocked refugee groups participated. On the Macedonian side of the fence a water cannon was placed. We will upload photos & videos later.
On the 18th of November 2015, Slovenia closed its borders for refugees who are not from Syria, Afghanistan or Iraq. Just a little later, Croatia, Serbia and Macedonia also adopted this practice of segregation. There is little doubt about that this policy was pushed by the European Union as a starting point for slowing down or even stopping the flow over the Balkan route. Thousands of refugees were stuck in Eidomeni, Greece, and started to protest. The Moving Europe Bus was on the spot and reported live from the 22nd of November to the 11th of December 2015 – when the camp had been evicted. On the 5th of February 2016, we decided to restart our live-ticker as the new year has already seen several attempts from the European Union to slow down the migration movement towards Europe. Macedonia seems to become a key player in this strategy. For several weeks the Macedonian border authorities have slowed down the transit process. The predictable effect of this, given the high arrival numbers to the Greek islands, is that thousands are becoming stuck in Greece. On the 3th of February the Macedonian government announced its plans to strengthen border controls which will further reduce the speed of the transit process. In the meantime, the Greek authorities have established a new buffer zone near to Eidomeni. Since the camp at the border has already become highly overcrowded, there are fears that the violent scenes of last December in Eidomeni will be repeated. Therefore the authorities have decided that people should be kept at bay, at a gas station on the highway that is 20 km far away from the border (at Polykastro). For weeks migrants have had to stay there for hours under miserable conditions. Since the end of January the situation at the Greek border zone has escalated once more. There is only a trickle of people being let through to Macedonia and now people at the gas station have to wait for days before their buses finally leave towards the border. On the 3rd of February 2016 thousands of them decided not to wait any longer at the petrol station and started to walk towards the Macedonian border (#marchofhope 2). Further protests and tensions are to be expected. The Moving Europe Bus is on the spot since the 2nd of February and reports live from Polykastro and Eidomeni.
