Some 2,000 mostly-Syrian refugees spent a rainy night stranded in no-man’s land between Greece and Macedonia as hundreds more began arriving Saturday on their way to Western Europe.
The refugees, who have been there since Thursday, spent the night sleeping on the ground despite heavy rain and temperatures which fell sharply during the night, AFP reported.
Army troops were deployed throughout the forested hills that line the 50-km border.
Macedonia’s riot police fired tear gas to disperse migrants after it declared a state of emergency on its borders. Skopje decided to allow a limited number of refugees in to continue their journey after at least eight people were injured in a crowd of 3,000 migrants.
Late on Friday, Macedonian police began allowing groups of several dozen to cross and take a train to the north in a bid to reach Western Europe.
Figures from the UN refugee agency show thousands of migrants, most of them from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, have been pouring into Greece on a weekly basis with the aim of traveling through Macedonia and Serbia to reach the European Union.
