Turkish authorities reported a seven-fold jump in the number of migrants attempting the dangerous sea crossing from Turkey to Greece in August.
This month to Aug. 28, 7,834 migrants and refugees were intercepted at sea, according to the Turkish Coast Guard. That compares to 1,311 during the same period last year.
In July, the number more than doubled, with 5,409 intercepted at sea compared to last year when 2,433 were picked up. Greece is the entry point to the Schengen Zone, an area compromising most of the European Union in which people can move from country to country without passport checks.
The year-on-year spike started in June with an increase of one-third, from 1,925 in June 2018 to 3,262 this June.
According to the United Nations, 174 migrants died or went missing making the crossing in 2018, compared to 57 so far this year.
The number of people attempting the perilous crossing usually goes up in the summer, but the latest jump came amid a crackdown on migrants in Turkey and intensified fighting in Syria.
The Istanbul governor’s office, connected to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s national government, announced in July that unregistered migrants in Istanbul had to leave the city and go to other provinces by August, although the deadline was later pushed back to October.
Since the announcement, police started detaining migrants and refugees.
The International Organization for Migration’s (IOM) spokesperson in Turkey Lanna Walsh said the group's workers, who operate alongside the coast guard, have noticed an increase in migrants rescued in recent weeks.
“Our teams that do work on the ground observed that many of the migrants trying to cross over last weekend… originated in Istanbul,” Walsh said.
Turkey has the largest number of displaced Syrians of any country, housing more than 3.6 million who fled the eight-year war. The country's interior minister last year said Syrians have had 380,000 babies in their adopted country since 2011.
NBC News
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