Press "Enter" to skip to content

Egyptian billionaire wants to buy island to house migrants.

Naguib-Sawiris


(Mara Ispaso)  Egyptian billionaire Naguib Sawiris has asked Greece and Italy to sell him an island so that he can develop it for the hundreds of thousands of refugees in the area.

In a television interview Swairis said he would approach the governments of Greece and Italy, saying there would be “temporary shelters to house the people, then you start employing the people to build housing, schools, universities, hospitals.

“And if things improve, whoever wants to go back (to their homeland) goes back.”

But he admitted his plan could face challenges, such as figuring out jurisdiction and customs regulations.

Swairis said the important thing is the migrants will be treated like “human beings.”

“The way they are being treated now, they are being treated like cattle,” he said.

When pictures surfaced of a three-year-old boy’s body lying face-down on the beach, it ignited an outcry around the world.

The Syrian boy, Aylan Kurdi, was one of 12 refugees who drowned when their boat sunk before reaching the Greek island of Kos. Thousands of migrants have died trying to reach Europe by sea this year.

Twelve bodies, five of which were children, were recovered. Nine of the 23 people on board the two boats were said to have survived.

However, it was the image of the three-year-old lying face down on the shore that tugged at the heart strings of people worldwide.

At the same time hundreds of migrants were stopped from boarding trains in Budapest, Hungary, in a two-day stand-off with authorities.

The number of migrants that have entered Europe this year from Syria, Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan, have reached record levels, with Germany expecting to take in a staggering 800 000 refugees.

This large increase in asylum seekers has created tension in the European Union, as other countries are not as willing to accept refugees as Germany is.