The Council of Europe slammed Greece for the conditions in which migrants are living in the camps of Lesbos and Samos. 

Commissioner for Human Rights, Dunja Mijatović, said people are now in a "struggle for survival".

The remarks came at the end of a five-day visit to facilities in Lesbos, Samos and Corinth. 

Mijatović spoke of the dramatic deterioration in the conditions of the people who have been living on the islands over the past 12 months.

She called for urgent measures and the transfer of asylum seekers from the islands to the mainland.

Mijatović said the situation is "explosive" and highlighted the unhygienic conditions in which migrants are kept, in overcrowded camps.

"People queue for hours to get food and to go to bathrooms when these are available. - the Commissioner said - On Samos, families are chipping away at rocks to make some space on steep hillsides to set up their makeshift shelters, often made from trees they cut themselves. This no longer has anything to do with the reception of asylum seekers. This has become a struggle for survival."

She welcomed the Greek government’s decision to transfer 20,000 migrants from the islands to the mainland by the end of the year but called for it to happen as a matter of urgency.

"If not urgently and adequately addressed, these abysmal conditions, combined with existing tensions, risk leading to further tragic events," she said.