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Tuesday, September 1, 2015

The Latest: 5th suspect in deaths of 71 migrants in jail

Authorities say the migrants suffocated in the truck. [...] both Austria and Hungary have stepped up efforts to crack down on possible smugglers. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban will meet with top EU officials on Thursday in Brussels about the crisis, including EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, EU Council President Donald Tusk, and European Parliament President Martin Schulz. The court ruled Tuesday they had been subjected to degrading and inhuman treatment during four days in an Italian detention center, suffered a collective expulsion and could not challenge their forced return home. Bavaria has opened Germany's first reception center meant to house only migrants from southeastern Europe, part of an effort to deal more quickly with people flooding in from the Balkans whose chances of being allowed to stay are minimal. The state's social affairs minister, Emilia Mueller, said authorities at the center will try to process asylum claims within six weeks. Police spokeswoman Katerina Rendlova said most of the migrants didn't have proper documents, including permission to enter Czech territory, so they were detained and will be sent to the country's migrant centers. Spain's conservative prime minister says his country is open to spreading out arriving refugees among the European Union's 28 nations, but isn't committing to take in more than the 2,739 it already has pledged to accept. Hungary has suspended all rail traffic from its main terminal in Budapest and cleared the train station of hundreds of migrants trying to board trains for Austria and Germany after scuffles broke out where a train was to leave for Vienna and Munich. Scores of locals, tourists and migrants with travel documents and tickets remained in the cavernous station, some staring at information boards still showing arrival and departure times. Citing Macedonian figures, UNICEF says four out of five of the migrants come from Syria. Since June, more than 52,000 people have been registered in the town of Gevgelija on the Greek border. Greece's coast guard says it has rescued nearly 1,200 migrants from the sea off its eastern Aegean islands in a single day, as the flood of people fleeing war and poverty to seek shelter in the European Union continues unabated. The coast guard said Tuesday it had picked up 1,192 people in 31 separate search-and-rescue operations from Monday morning to Tuesday morning off the islands of Lesbos, Chios, Samos, Agathonissi, Farmakonissi, Kos and Megisti.


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