Woman and child killed and two others injured after a tent caught fire

Two people were killed and two others were injured after a fire broke out at a migrant camp on the Greek island of Lesbos late on Thursday, a police official told Reuters.

The official said that a 66-year-old woman and a six-year old child were killed when a tent caught fire in the camp of Moria. Two other people were seriously injured.

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Police and the fire brigade were investigating the scene, a government official said, adding that initial evidence showed the fire was probably caused by accident.

Clashes broke out following the incident between dozens of migrants and police, officials said. The government official said the skirmishes were brief.

More than 6,000 migrants and refugees are stranded on the island of Lesbos, twice the capacity of state facilities.

Tensions have boiled over at overcrowded camps in the country, which is also struggling to emerge from a debt crisis, as the slow processing of asylum requests adds to frustration over living conditions.

Under a European Union deal with Turkey, migrants and refugees arriving after 20 March are to be held in centres set up on five Aegean islands, including Lesbos, and sent back if their asylum applications are not accepted.</s>Angry migrants set fire to a camp on the Greek island of Lesbos on Thursday after a woman and a six-year-old child died following a gas cylinder explosion, local police said.

The explosion occurred while the 66-year-old woman was cooking, police said, adding that the child's mother and four-year-old sibling were hospitalised with serious injuries.

In an apparent act of rage, migrants then set fire to the Moria camp on Lesbos, causing significant damage, police said.

Firefighters arrived at the scene to try to put out the flames.</s>A migrant stands among the remains of a burned tent after a fire broke out at the Moria migrant camp, on the Greek island of Lesbos, Greece, November 25, 2016. Petros Tsamkakis/Intimenews via REUTERS

ATHENS (Reuters) - Two migrants were killed and two others were injured in a fire at a migrant camp on the Greek island of Lesbos late on Thursday, prompting clashes between other migrants and the police, authorities said on Friday.

The fire broke out at 2020 GMT after a gas canister used for cooking exploded in a tent in the camp of Moria. A woman, 66, and a 6-year-old child were killed, police said, and another woman, 25, and a 4-year-old child were seriously injured and transferred to Athens.

After the fire, dozens of frustrated migrants fought briefly with police. Many people evacuated the center and camped under trees.

"We are not animals, we are human beings," a migrant told reporters. "You people say United Nations, United Nations has human rights but we don't see any human rights here. We don't see any freedom, we don't see any democracy here."

Video footage showed tents in flames and migrants searching through debris. Dozens of tents were burned and container cabins with medical supplies, clothes and documents were damaged, a police official said.

Police and the fire brigade were investigating the incident. The fire was contained early in the morning.

More than 6,000 migrants and refugees are stranded on Lesbos, an island close to the western coast of Turkey. Their total is twice the capacity of the government-run camp of Moria and a center administered by the municipality.

Tensions have boiled over at overcrowded camps in the Greece, which is struggling to emerge from a debt crisis, as the slow processing of asylum requests adds to frustration over living conditions.

Migration Minister Yannis Mouzalas told parliament the government would start transferring migrants to the mainland soon to reduce overcrowding at island camps and urged residents to cooperate with the state and help to ease tensions.

Under a European Union deal with Turkey, migrants and refugees arriving after March 20 are to be held in centers set up on five Aegean islands, including Lesbos, and sent back if their asylum applications are not accepted.

Referring to the incident and the management of the migrant crisis, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said the government "was fighting a battle in adverse conditions".

"I'm shocked by the tragic event in Moria," he said in a statement. "The Greek government will further intensify efforts for safety and a better quality of life in reception centers."</s>ATHENS: Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Friday expressed shock and pledged to improve conditions in migrant camps after a fire killed two people and badly burned two more on the island of Lesbos.

“I am shocked, as are all Greeks, by this tragic incident,” Tsipras said during a visit to the north of the country.

“The Greek government… will intensify efforts for safety and quality of life at hospitality centers,” Tsipras said, referring to the country’s camps.

Hours earlier, a 66-year-old Iraqi Kurd and her six-year-old grandson died from the apparent explosion of a cooking gas canister inside their tent at the camp of Moria.

The boy’s mother and four-year-old sibling suffered life-threatening burns and were airlifted to Athens.

In an apparent act of rage, migrants then set fire to part of the camp, causing significant damage, police said.

Ensuing clashes between migrants and police left six migrants slightly injured, while several more were taken to Lesbos hospital with lesser burns and respiratory problems.

Some migrants fled the camp after the blast but later returned and calm was restored, a police source said.

Several fires—not all accidental—have erupted in refugee camps on the Greek islands, where some 16,000 people became stranded after the European Union signed a deal that was aimed at stemming the influx of migrants.

Moria has a capacity for 3,500 people but currently houses more than 5,000.

Part of the camp was badly damaged in a fire on September 19 during clashes between migrants and police, and thousands had to be moved out before returning two days later.

Nearly 66,000 refugees and migrants are currently stranded in Greece, according to official figures. AFP</s>A young boy and a woman have been killed by a fire at a refugee detention centre on the Greek island of Lesbos.

Police said the two victims died after a blaze started by a cooking gas cannister spread at the Moria camp, where migrants are being held while facing deportation back to Turkey.

Two others were hospitalised, including another child, with extensive burns, an officer told the Associated Press.

The fire was put out late on Thursday night but the extent of the damage was not immediately clear. Asylum seekers clashed with police during the evacuation, which follows months of unrest over processing delays and dire conditions at the camp.

Lesbos is one of several Greek islands holding thousands of migrants - far over their capacity - waiting for decisions on their asylum applications after crossing the Aegean Sea.

The controversial EU-Turkey deal has seen all those arriving since March detained under the threat of deportation, causing the main route to Europe to shift to the Central Mediterranean Sea.

Tensions are running high among migrants unable to continue their journeys to Western Europe, with 61,000 people trapped in Greece by a series of border closures through the Balkans.

There have also been clashes with locals on some islands, with a camp on Chios coming under attack by a far-right mob armed with Molotov cocktails last week.

Britain and several other European nations have refused to resettle migrants arriving in Italy and Greece according to quotas.

2016 is now the deadliest year on record for refugees trying to reach Europe, with almost 4,700 people drowning or suffocating on overcrowded boats.</s>ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Greece’s prime minister expressed shock Friday at the deaths of a woman and child in a fire that raged through an island refugee camp used for migrants facing deportation back to Turkey, while rights groups condemned the loss of life.

Alexis Tsipras said he was “shocked, as is the entire Greek nation, by the tragic event” in the Moria camp on Lesbos overnight. The aid agency International Rescue Committee described the deaths as “a damning indictment of the ineptitude of Eurpean leaders’ response to the refugee crisis.”

Police said a cooking gas canister sparked the fire, and that the victims were a young boy and an older woman. Another woman and a second child were severely injured and flown to Athens, where they were hospitalized in serious condition, while several others were less seriously hurt.

Migrants at the camp clashed with police as they were evacuated from the camp during the blaze, which was extinguished by firefighters.

“The Greek government is fighting a determined battle in difficult circumstances for the humanitarian management of the refugee issue, and will further intensify its efforts for security and quality of life in the shelters,” Tsipras said in a statement.

Panos Navrozidis, the IRC’s country director for Greece, said in a statement that the group had already warned of the dangers of overcrowded conditions in Greek camps, and about conditions in Moria.

“As a humanitarian, it is soul-crushing to see events like this happen within the European Union,” he said. “It is an abdication of our responsibility as global leaders that we, in Europe, refuse to do better for some of the world’s most vulnerable.”

Protests have repeatedly occurred at overcrowded deportation camps. Under a deal reached in March between Turkey and the European Union, migrants arriving on Greek islands from Turkey face deportation back to Turkey unless they successfully apply for asylum in Greece. The deal was designed to stanch the flow of hundreds of thousands of refugees and migrants into the European Union via the Aegean Sea route.

While the number of people arriving on Greek islands has dropped significantly as a result, it has not stopped altogether. Thousands of people are stranded in severely overcrowded camps on the islands, leading to tension within the camps as well as with locals. In total, more than 62,000 people are stranded in Greece, while an EU agreement to relocate tens of thousands of them to other European countries is suffering severe delays.

Separately on Friday, the coast guard said a patrol boat located 42 migrants on a sailboat 36 nautical miles (41 miles; 66 kilometers) southeast of the southern Greek island of Crete. The vessel was located after one of the passengers made a call to emergency services, the coast guard said. All the passengers were transported to the town of Ierapetra on Crete, and were reported in good health.
Two people are killed and two others injured after a fire breaks out in a migrant camp on the Greek island of Lesbos. The cause is currently under investigation, although some believe the fire was deliberately started in protest of poor living conditions, after a 66-year-old woman and a six-year-old child were killed in a gas explosion.