Migrant Crisis: Tragedy Of The Tiny Boy Who Symbolises Desperation Of Thousands - Eastern Mirror
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Migrant Crisis: Tragedy of the tiny boy who symbolises desperation of thousands

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By EMN Updated: Sep 02, 2015 11:13 pm

Agencies
CALAIS, SEPTEMBER 2

Cradled carefully in a stranger’s arms, this tiny boy could be sleeping as he is carried up the beach.
But the Syrian child, still dressed in shorts and T-shirt, will never wake to run on the sands where his body was washed ashore on Wednesday morning.He is perhaps the most pitiful of the victims of the deepening migrant crisis and he no doubt died as his family fought for a better life for him. Pressure has grown on Prime Minister David Cameron to increase Britain’s involvement in sharing the burden of the hundreds of thousands of people arriving on European soil.
Yvette Cooper, who is standing for the Labour leadership, suggested that it should be possible to take some 10,000 people seeking asylum.
The unnamed boy is just one of 2,500 people who have already died this year while fleeing violence, oppression and poverty and trying to reach Europe by sea.
The child, who is probably only two or three years old, was found on a beach in Bodrum on Wednesday and his lifeless body was recovered by a Turkish gendarmerie. The fate of his family is unknown, but it is believed his is one of at least 11 people who lost their lives when two boats capsized off the Turkish coast.
A vessel carrying 16 people reportedly sank in international waters after heading for the Greek island of Kos from the holiday resort. Only four people could be rescued.
Hours later, a second ship carrying six people sank – killing a woman and three children. Two migrants in life jackets were able to make it to shore half-conscious.
The route between Bodrum and Kos is one of the shortest from Turkey to the Greek islands – about 13 miles. Thousands are attempting the perilous sea crossing despite the risks.
Elsewhere in Europe, thousands of migrants remain stranded at a station in Budapest after being prevented from getting on trains, and more than 4,200 people arrived on the Greek island of Lesbos by ship.
Chaotic scenes and 16-hour delays hit London-bound Eurostar services overnight as migrants climbed on to the roof of an 186mph train and attempted to break into train carriages.
Passengers on board one train stranded near Calais are understood to have threatened to smash the windows after a power outage left the sweltering carriage in total darkness for five hours.
At Greece’s northern border with Macedonia, people are camping out waiting to head further north.
Macedonian authorities have been allowing small groups to cross at a time and head to the Gevgelija train station. And naval vessels from several nations continued to patrol Mediterranean waters off the coast of Libya in hopes of preventing more mass drownings.
Germany, France and the UK have called for a meeting of EU interior and justice ministers in mid-September to work out new responses to the crisis. While Germany says it expects to receive 800,000 migrants – quadruple last year’s figure – many other EU nations face criticism for failing to commit to housing more asylum seekers.
In comparison, Britain received 25,771 asylum applications in the year ending June 2015, according to the Home Office.
Ms Cooper said on Tuesday: ‘If every city took 10 refugee families, if every London borough took 10 families, if every county council took 10 families, if Scotland, Wales and every English region played their part, then in a month we’d have nearly 10,000 more places for vulnerable refugees fleeing danger, seeking safety.’
She said the failure to offer sanctuary to refugees trying to escape the ‘new totalitarianism’ of Islamic State in the Middle East was ‘immoral’ and ‘cowardly’. And fellow Labour leadership contender Andy Burnham said the British government is treating the refugee crisis as if it is nothing more than a ‘tedious inconvenience’ for holidaymakers and urged the UK to ‘share the burden of caring for genuine asylum seekers’.
Mr Cameron has been warned his hopes of overhauling the European Union will be blocked if Britain refuses to accept more refugees from north Africa.
Austria and Germany – key allies in the Prime Minister’s push for change in Brussels – have condemned the UK for not opening the doors to asylum seekers.
They warned Mr Cameron that ‘solidarity is not a one-way street’ and said his hopes of renegotiating EU membership will be scuppered if he behaves like Britain is ‘out of the club’.
Mr Cameron has promised to renegotiate Britain’s membership of the EU before holding an in-out vote by the end of 2017.

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By EMN Updated: Sep 02, 2015 11:13:08 pm
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