'Disaster waiting to happen'

The images tell a devastating story. Some photos depict parts of the Moria camp on the island of Lesbos reduced to sticks and ash. Others show refugees, homeless once again, stranded on the street. For many, these photos are an indictment of Europe; for others, of the international community as a whole.

"Last night's fires at Moria on the Greek island of Lesbos symbolize the shortcomings of the European response to the refugee crisis," said the International Rescue Committee (IRC) in a press statement on its website. It then called on leaders currently in New York for a much-publicized summit to reconsider the systems put in place by the EU-Turkey deal agreed upon in March.

The blaze, which police say was started by migrants inside the camp, forced at least 4,000 residents to flee, including many unaccompanied minors. With nowhere else to go, many of them spent the night on the street.

'A disaster waiting to happen'

Authorities later arrested a group of suspects, including Afghans, Iraqis, Syrians and Cameroonians. Reports suggested a fight had broken out between different ethnic groups amid growing tension in the camp following rumors that more migrants would be sent to Turkey.

"It just goes to show [what happens] when you leave so many people in such miserable conditions," Amnesty International researcher Giorgos Kosmopoulos told DW. "This was a disaster waiting to happen."

Kosmopoulos, who was at the camp on Tuesday following the blaze, said much of it - around 60 percent, according to some reports - had been burned down, and that many people would likely be forced to sleep outside for a second night. The unaccompanied minors, meanwhile, had been bussed to a different location, which he hadn't visited yet.

He said that conditions in the camp - a former army barracks - had been getting steadily worse since March. People had complained about the poor quality of the food. Some had fallen ill. The camp itself was well over capacity. A general feeling of negativity pervaded life there.

"Fear is always present in the conversations you're having with the people," Kosmopoulos said. "The other thing is the lack of clarity about what is happening."

New approach needed

The March agreement between Brussels and Ankara was meant to reduce the number of arrivals to the continent by having many of them sent to Turkey. But it also meant that thousands of refugees were stuck in Greece as they waited for their asylum claims to be processed, thanks to what IRC calls "opaque and inconsistent" policies put in place by the deal. On Lesbos alone there are some 5,600 refugees - over 2,000 more than the camps on the island can hold.

Kosmopoulos said the international community - not just Europe - needed to take an honest look at what was causing the crisis. He pointed not only to ongoing conflicts in the Middle East and Central Asia, but also to a lack of a coordinated global resettlement program, something that has put too much of the burden on Greece.

His message to those leaders meeting in New York was simple: "Stop looking the other way, stop hiding your head in the sand, look at the reality."