As Europe’s migration crisis continues Oxfam and other NGOs face the challenge of delivering a humanitarian response in changing and unfamiliar circumstances. Emma Fanning, Oxfam Humanitarian Policy Adviser, reflects on a recent visit to Greece and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonian border evaluating the situation and Oxfam’s response so far.

We arrived late at the Macedonian border, missing the train’s arrival. Most people had already disappeared across the dark fence – a 4km midnight trek to the Serbian entry point. The stragglers were those with children, the elderly, and the confused.

Under the industrial lamp light a family prepared to cross, strapping babies on to their fronts in carriers like we use for our one year old son. A five year old girl smiled shyly into my eyes as she held her father’s hand and slipped over. A small group of boys who looked 14 at most headed off, past the family stuck at the border, and the bewildered old man who’d lost his papers.

There is apparently a trade in stolen papers. When I visited the border in mid-February only Afghans, Iraqis and Syrians were allowed through. Oxfam’s partners, MYLA and La Strada tried to explain to the family what was happening, translating, explaining the law and their options. If the old man was unlucky he would have to go back to Lesbos or wherever he entered Greece from, and re-register. In the race to get to Germany before refugee policy changed again and borders shut, his competent daughter, with her four children, had to decide whether to press on or go back with him. I hope he wasn’t Afghan, as 24 hours later the Greek border closed to them.

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