Having spent more than a decade closely documenting the plight of asylum seekers in the central Mediterranean, I leapt at the opportunity to cover the story in Greece, Macedonia, Serbia and Croatia for the Jesuit Refugee Service earlier this year. 

A lifejacket floats on the surface of the water at the port of Mytilene on the Greek island of Lesbos, January 29, 2016. Photo: Darrin Zammit Lupi

Biting cold air envelopes the small army of NGO volunteers coming from all over Europe on the rocky foreshore, close to the airport outside Mytilene, on the Greek island of Lesbos.

The volunteers are on the frontline of the migration crisis in the Aegean, looking towards the mountains that line the western shore of Turkey. They are searching for a glimpse of yet another boat of asylum seekers, risking life and limb in search of a better, and safer, life.

It’s part of a…