Frontex

On November 17 last year, when Hervé Yves Caniard entered the 14-floor conference room of the European Union border agency Frontex in Warsaw, European newspapers were flooded with stories of refugees a few hundreds kilometres away, braving the cold at the Belarusian border with Poland.

The European Union has finally started to see the Greek policy of pushbacks in the Aegean Sea, which has claimed many lives of asylum seekers, Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said on May 7.

Turkish security forces have recovered the bodies of seven more irregular migrants, who froze to death after Greek border guards pushed them back, bringing the number of the fatalities to 19.

Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu said the bodies of 12 irregular migrants were found near the İpsala border crossing between Turkey and Greece without shoes and stripped of their clothes.

Pushbacks in the Aegean Sea have diverted vessels carrying irregular migrants to Italy, Turkey's interior minister said on Nov. 19.

Noting recent reports of an increase in irregular migrant arrivals in Italy from Turkey, Süleyman Soylu told Anadolu Agency that the ships carrying these migrants were not coming from Turkey.

Greece will respond resolutely in defending the EU's external borders against possible migrant pressure from Turkey, after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accused Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis of "lying" about the migrant crisis.

Erdogan Threatens Athens Directly: If we Open our Borders, I don't Know what will Happen to Greece

In an escalation of the migrant crisis being fomented by Belarusian dictator Aleksandr Lukashenko, with the alleged help of his political ally Russian President Vladimir Putin, designed to destabilise EU countries and test their military capabilities, tensions began growing when a large group of migrants on Monday attempted to cross into Poland at an official border-crossing point.

Greece's police minister on Oct. 10 said 250 additional guards would be deployed on the country's land border with Turkey, where thousands of asylum-seekers tried to enter last year.

The Commission is not currently going to respond to Greece's request for financing the activity of the Greek Coast Guard to the tune of 15.8 million euros.

Lithuania plans to build a barrier on the border with Belarus and deploy troops to prevent migrants from illegally crossing into its territory, news wires reported. According to PM Ingrida Simonyte, more than 1,000 migrants had been held after crossing the border since 1 June.

UN agencies are pressing the European Union to end the growing practices of denying migrants their right to apply for asylum, collectively expelling them and using violence against people trying to enter the bloc without authorization.