ACTIVISTS hit out at Europe’s treatment of refugees today, the day after  fire in a massively overcrowded refugee camp on the Greek island of Lesbos killed a woman and her baby.

The blaze in the European Union-sponsored Moria camp — built to house 3,000 but now home to more than 13,000 people, the majority Afghan — is believed to have started yesterday afternoon near or inside a shipping container in which the woman lived.

Accounts differ between the Lesbos authorities, refugees and charity workers at the scene. The Associated Press agency reported that camp-dwellers started the fire in a desperate protest against their conditions. But soon after police arrived the camp was doused in tear gas and fights ensued.