UN refugee agency accuses Cyprus government of pushing asylum seekers into a UN buffer zone

Associated Press

NICOSIA, Cyprus (AP) — The United Nations refugee agency is accusing government authorities in ethnically divided Cyprus of rounding up dozens of migrants and forcing them back inside a U.N.-controlled buffer zone that they crossed to seek asylum. UNHCR spokeswoman Emilia Strovolidou told the Associated Press Friday that as many as 99 asylum seekers where “pushed back” into the buffer zone in the last three months. The asylum seekers entered the European Union member country from the breakaway Turkish Cypriot north and crossed the buffer zone into the south where they could file their applications with the internationally-recognized government. The Cyprus government says it won’t allow the buffer zone to become a migrant entry point and that U.N. is wrong to speak of pushbacks.