The Strange Death of Europe: Immigration, Identity, Islam

European Convention on Human Rights

They also include a growing number of people fleeing poverty, joblessness or a lack of prospects, and who see Europe as the answer to their problems and Greece as their way into Europe

1922 these islands were flooded with Greek citizens fleeing Asia Minor. More than three million Greeks fled what is now Turkey, via islands like Lesbos where today one in three residents is descended from those refugees

Their preferred boats are plastic ones, and unlike the great funeral pyres of wooden boats intermittently burned on Lampedusa, these plastic vessels cannot be burnt

From the northernmost parts of the island of Lesbos you can see Turkey clearer than most Greek islands are visible one to another. Five miles of water is all that divides this portion of Europe from Turkey

The dozens of Greek islands within short sailing distance of the Turkish coastline makes the northern Aegean and Dodecanese islands an even softer underbelly of the continent than those nearest North

As in the Italian islands, the boats have been coming into the islands of Greece for years. And like the Italians, for years the Greek authorities had to try to deal with this problem on their own

Over to the west of the Mediterranean is another route entirely, going up from Morocco and into Spain. Migrants have flowed across this narrowest gap between Africa and Europe, the Straits of Gibraltar, for decades

And they forget that the boats do not only head out from Libya, but also launch from Egypt, Tunisia and Algeria.

During recent years boats full of migrants have also come ashore on the islands nearest to Lampedusa, including Malta and Sicily.