GREECE and Turkey threw up new barriers over the weekend in the scramble to keep refugees from Afghanistan out.

Turkey is constructing a new wall along its 335-mile border with Iran while Greece announced on Friday the completion of an extension of its own border wall with Turkey.

Greek Citizens’ Protection Minister Michalis Chrisochoidis said the crisis in Afghanistan, where the Taliban seized the capital a week ago as US troops fled the country following a 20-year occupation, had created “possibilities for migrant flows.

“We cannot wait, passively, for the possible impact,” he said. “Our borders will remain safe and inviolable.”

Migration Minister Notis Mitarachi said Greece would not accept being a “gateway” into Europe for Afghan refugees and that they would be safe in Turkey.

Yet Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned last week that “Turkey has no duty, responsibility or obligation to be Europe’s refugee warehouse.”

A notorious agreement struck by Turkey and the EU in 2016 saw refugees returned to Turkey after reaching EU territory — a breach of international law.

The country hosts over three million Syrian refugees and hundreds of thousands of Afghans, and Ankara holds that the EU did not live up to its promises in return, which included reviving talks on EU accession and easier visa access for Turkish citizens.

The European Union held urgent talks at the weekend about how to keep refugees out, with Austria suggesting it should set up detention camps in Afghanistan’s neighbours.

“It must be our goal to keep the majority of the people in the region,” Interior Minister Karl Nehammer said, while French President Emmanuel Macron said European countries must “protect ourselves from significant irregular migratory flows.”

Greece and France were both among the countries that sent troops to assist the US-led invasion and subsequent occupation.

“The New Democracy government [in Greece] cannot claim it is not responsible for the refugee crisis, because like all governments of the last 20 years it supported the US-Nato-EU intervention, even participating in the military occupation,” the Communist Party of Greece warned.

“Its responsibilities are growing, because neither the reactionary EU refugee policy it hides behind nor the unacceptable EU-Turkey agreement can guarantee the rights of refugees. Instead of showing off its fences and building prisons, it should proceed with direct asylum procedures for countries of destination.”