Athens Sends Protest Note to Austria Over Vienna Migration Conference

The Greek Foreign Ministry delivered a note of protest to Austrian Ambassador to Greece Andrea Ikic-Boehm in light of Vienna planning to host a ministerial conference on refugees with the participation of Western Balkan states, but in the absence of Athens, the ministry said in a statement on Tuesday.

ATHENS (Sputnik) — According to the statement, through this "unilateral move, which is not at all friendly" toward Greece, an attempt is being made to take decisions "that directly concern Greece and the Greek borders" without the participation of Athens officials.

"The Foreign Ministry’s Political Director, Ambassador Petros Mavroeidis, yesterday delivered to the Austrian Ambassador here, Andrea Ikić-Böhm, a demarche regarding the initiative for organizing, in Vienna, a conference of the Interior and Foreign Ministers of Austria and the countries of the Western Balkans," the statement on the ministry’s website reads.

A corresponding protest note has also been delivered by the Greek Embassy in Vienna to the Foreign Ministry of Austria, the statement added.

Europe is currently struggling to cope with a massive refugee influx, with hundreds of thousands of refugees and migrants fleeing conflict-torn countries of the Middle East and North Africa in search of safety and refuge. Most refugees travel to the Greek islands before continuing onward to mainland Europe.

According to the International Organization for Migration, some 102,500 refugees and migrants have arrived in Greece in 2016 out of the estimated total of 110,000 arrivals to Europe this year.