Macedonia Begins To Clear Refugee Backlog

More than 5,000 refugees have been able to board trains and buses to Serbia and northern Europe, ending their ordeal in makeshift camps on the border between Greece and Macedonia.

Some of the people - mainly from Syria, but also from other countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan - have spent days in the open with little or no food after Macedonia declared a state of emergency and closed its borders to them.

Also on Saturday night thousands had managed to get through to the town of Gevgelija, where trains were waiting to take them to Serbia.

Sky News reporter Tom Rayner says many will then continue their journey to Hungary, where the borderless Schengen area begins, before heading further north, most hoping to reach Germany or Sweden.

For those left at the border between Greece and Macedonia, there is a more visible presence from aid agencies helping the vulnerable and the injured, along with a "small infrastructure" being built at the border, with portable toilets being brought in, locals bringing bread, water and selling vegetables.

Rayner says: "This flow of people is not a single move - it's continuous. And we will see an increase in that infrastructure building and the people here really do need that."

One man, among those waiting at the border told Sky News: "It's very very bad. We are people, we are not animals.

"We are alive. We need a good life - we don't need a war."

Frustration and desperation had boiled over on Saturday, when thousands stormed through the police line to cross the border, despite police throwing grenades and using batons, before giving up and letting the people through.

Syrian Fatima Hamido, 23, was among those who had slept outside in the rain with nothing to eat, saying: "In this Europe, animals are sleeping in beds and we sleep in the rain."

Saeed, 32, from Syria said of the blocked border: "We know this was not Macedonia and the Macedonian police. This was the European Union. Please tell Brussels we are coming, no matter what."

Rayner says there are about 2,000 people a day flowing through that part of the border into Macedonia, adding: "I think the (Macedonian) authorities are aware that...this exodus of Syrian refugees is not something they can stop but it's about trying to have some order in this process as they move on."

The Macedonian government criticised Greece for letting the refugees through and even aiding their passage by chartering ships to take them from the Greek islands to mainland Europe.