Macedonia only letting Migrants from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan

Since last week, Macedonia, which lies on the main migrant route to northern Europe, has restricted passage to only Syrians, Iraqis and Afghans who are considered war refugees.

Some have been protesting by not eating or talking and around a dozen have sewn up their mouths. He added that he wanted to go “to any free country in the world”. Only 148 refugees have been relocated to other European Union countries – Finland, Luxembourg and Sweden, Mr Edwards said. The man cannot go back.

The Bulgarian news agency Bgnes reports that some migrants are chanting “We are not terrorists”, and have removed their shirts, while also refusing blankets, food and water offered to them by activists at the scene.

Finland, which has seen a tenfold increase in asylum-seekers this year to an expected 35,000, adopted ID checks and tighter border controls in September.

The Bundespolizei, responsible for border security, confirmed Monday 180,000 had arrived this month, positioning November to most likely break the previous monthly high of 181,000 set in October.

The move to filter refugees came amid fears prompted by recent attacks in Paris that among the hundreds of thousands of refugees trying to escape war and persecution, there could be people planning attacks in Europe.

Although the measures have garnered criticism from different human-rights groups, which are warning that asylum should be granted on merit and not by nationality, the countries are not showing signs they will alter their newly implemented filtering. The weather is getting colder on a daily basis. They are not processing individual claims.

Thousands of migrants are upset with Balkan nations now refusing certain nationalities entry.

Increasingly stormy winter weather is making crossings by sea to Europe more unsafe, and refugees trekking northwards through the Balkans are now exposed to freezing cold and snow. A large percentage of these traveled from the affected countries like Syria, Afghanistan, Eritrea, Somalia, and Iraq, according to UNHCR. Brussels remains under lockdown after a number of raids, and Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia, and Serbia tightened their borders this week, denying passage to anyone not fleeing conflict.