Greek authorities say they have thwarted tens of thousands of illegal crossings at the land border with Turkey so far this year, according to reports.
Migration pressure is increasing along the Evros River, which separates northeastern Greece from Turkey.
Low water levels in recent weeks have been attracting more smugglers and migrants seeking desirable crossing conditions, AFP reports.
“In the first four months of 2022, about 40,000 illegal immigrants have tried to enter the country illegally,” Minister of Civil Protection Takis Theodorikakos revealed to Skai TV last week.
“We effectively repel any threat to our country, to our borders.”
Theodorikakos warned Ankara not to “tolerate traffickers of desperate people, nor to foster such situations.”
Illegal migration towards Greece during the first four months of 2022 was almost 30 percent higher than the same period last year, according to a government source.
Nearly every route monitored by Frontex, the European Union’s border security agency, has seen major increases in migrant traffic.
“The Eastern Mediterranean route saw the number of arrivals of irregular migrants more than doubled in the January-March period to more than 7,000.The significant increase was driven by the detections of illegal border crossings in Cyprus, which rose three-fold to over 5,100 (on 7,005 detections for all Eastern Med route),” Frontex revealed in a report last month.
Prior to the onset of the COVID crisis and related border closures, illegal migration into Europe was soaring, along with asylum applications.
In mid-2020, Europol predicted a flood of migration from third world countries heavily affected by global lockdowns and economic deceleration.
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Shoot the invaders!