Balkan immigrant rail tracks follow old Orient Express route

GEVGELIJA, Macedonia (AP) — There are no fancy dining carriages here, glasses of champagne or ace sleuth Hercule Poirot to solve a murder mystery.

Day or night, rain or sunshine, tens of thousands of people are walking along Balkan train tracks or packing train carriages along the same famed rail line that used to connect Europe with Turkey and on to the Middle East.

In the 1930s, the Orient Express had a reputation for comfort and luxury, carrying elegant sleeping cars and restaurant cars known for the quality of their cuisine.

[...] carrying desperate families with crying babies fleeing the Middle East, Asia or Africa, the trains rumble through Greece, Serbia and Macedonia with drab, worn carriages, traveling over rusty tracks that have not seen upgrades or so many passengers in decades.

Taking the tracks means a longer but a safer route that does not involve paying hefty fees to smugglers to spirit you across the border in trucks and vans in the dark.

Some of the most violent clashes between migrants and police have happened on the railway tracks between Greece and Macedonia, where Macedonian police fired stun grenades to disperse a crowd that, frustrated after spending three nights out in the open, tried to charge them several times.

[...] up the route, Hungary suspended all rail traffic from its main terminal in Budapest and cleared the Keleti station of hundreds of people trying to board trains for Austria and Germany.

[...] over 12,000 asylum seekers stepped off their trains Saturday to a different welcome in the southern German city of Munich: clean beds, medical care and offers of food and clothing.