More refugees arrive on Greek islands the day after new EU deal with Turkey

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Andrew Feinberg

White House Correspondent

The number of refugees entering Greece via its islands in the Aegean Sea has gone up, say officials, a day after the deal between the European Union and Turkey to limit arrivals was implemented.

Authorities said that 1,662 people had arrived on Greek islands by 7am Monday, a day after the official implentation of the deal, twice the count of the day before.

Monitors from Turkey arrived on the Greek islands Lesbos and Chios to help supervise an agreement aimed at limiting the number of refugees flowing into the EU via smugglers’ boats.

The officers were to stay for at least a week as Greek authorities scrambled to implement the landmark deal reached last week between the EU and Turkey that includes faster refugee relocations to European countries as well as collective deportations of migrants from Greek islands back to Turkey.

Under the EU-Turkey roadmap agreed on Friday, a co-ordination structure must be created by Friday and some 4,000 personnel – more than half from other EU member states – deployed to the islands by next week.

AP; Reuters