German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer is to hold talks in Ankara and Athens on the continuing migration crisis. His trip comes as the number of migrants crossing to Greece from Turkey grows once more.
As the situation for refugees and migrants in Turkey is going from bad to worse, particularly for Afghans, a growing number of them is trying to reach the Greek islands in the Aegean Sea. Many of these islands are mere kilometers away from the Turkish coast. InfoMigrants answers important questions about the worsening crisis, including how it came to a head.
Two days after a migrant woman died in the Moria refugee camp on Lesbos, 215 migrants arrived on the mainland on Tuesday by ferry as part of government efforts to tackle massive overcrowding in the camp. Other measures include speeding up asylum applications and returning 10,000 migrants to Turkey.
Albania's Defense Ministry said that one of its ships in the Aegean Sea has rescued 111 migrants. The migrants were trying to cross into Greece from Turkey and have since been handed over to Turkish authorities.
This year, so far, has seen a huge influx of refugees arriving in Lesbos. Conditions in the Moria camp are steadily becoming worse and refugees are often left to their own devices.
The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) says migrants in Greece are in urgent need of support. The organization says with the arrival of winter, the conditions in the camps will deteriorate and migrants' lives will be at risk.
The number of migrants presenting at registration camps on the Greek islands has topped 20,000 once more, according to data released by the Greek Ministry of Citizen Protection. The number of people living at facilities on the islands in the eastern Aegean Sea had dropped down to 14,000 in April.
According to the Greek coast guard, its own patrol boats and EU border agency Frontex on Wednesday spotted nearly 120 people trying to reach Greece from Turkey on motorized rubber dinghies and wooden boats. Close to 20,000 migrants are currently staying in overcrowded camps on Greek islands in the eastern Aegean Sea.
Authorities say EU border agency Frontex has provided the Greek coast guard with a crewless airship to help combat irregular immigration and to augment search and rescue operations in the eastern Aegean Sea, where close to 20,000 migrants are staying in overcrowded camps on Greek islands. Separately, police found nearly 130 migrants in vehicles and detained two smugglers in two unrelated incidents, one in Greece and one in North Macedonia.
Eight people died after a boat carrying migrants sank near the Greek island of Kos Monday morning. A search and rescue operation is ongoing.
The migrants were trying to get from Turkey to EU country Greece, which has seen a large number of arrivals recently. Boats continue to arrive despite the pact between the EU and Turkey, which allows Greece to sent rejected asylum seekers back to Turkey.
There were significantly more migrants that came from Turkey to Greece in May. On the Aegean islands, there are now over 15,000 migrants in camps that were designed to hold less than 9,000. Meanwhile, most refugees in Greece asking to be reunited with family members in Germany are rejected.