Turkey – Turkey may have begun closure of its borders to migrants as the number of Syrian refugees pushing to enter the country has continued to rise, report said.
An assault by Russian-backed Syrian forces around the city of Aleppo had sent more than 30,000 people fleeing to the Turkish border of Oncupinar in the past few days.
The report said that tens of thousands more migrant could be on the move to enter the country.
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According to the report, the surge has created a bitter irony for Turkey.
It said that over 2.5 million refugees from Syria had migrated to Turkey in the last five years since the war in the country began.
“It is also under pressure to stop their perilous onward journeys to Europe and to prevent radical militants from sneaking over what was long a porous border to carry out attacks in Turkey or abroad,’’ it said.
“As it tries to keep the gates shut at Oncupinar and provides aid across the border, the Turkish government now finds itself receiving calls to let people in.
“We have much wider considerations now; there are terrorist organisations that were not there when the Syrian conflict first began,” a senior government official who deals with immigration issues said.
He explained how the situation on the border had changed in recent years.
“A growing number of refugees just wanted to use Turkey as a staging post to Europe in spite of the dangers, leaving Ankara with a responsibility to stop incidents like the drowning of a Syrian toddler last September. (Reuters/NAN)
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