Fabrice Leggeri

The EU border agency Frontex said on Thursday that it will deploy additional guards at Greece's border with Macedonia where migrants have been stranded for more than a week now.

The deployment of additional officers, who will assist with registration of migrants, will begin next week, Frontex said in a statement.

Greeks will collaborate with European guards to manage their frontier with the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) said Frontex, the EU border agency, on Thursday after a deal was brokered to address concerns over Athens’ commitment to control migration.

Frontex Chief Fabrice Leggeri told German tabloid Bild that the influx of refugees to Europe is expected to increase. He called on EU countries to “arrest if necessary” in cases where refugees do not have the right to asylum status. “Whoever travels illegally doesn’t have the right to receive asylum and should be rapidly returned to their country,” he told Bild.

The badly decomposed bodies of two children were found washed up on the Greek island of Kos on Oct.4, the latest victims of a crisis that has seen 630,000 people enter the EU illegally this year.

The head of EU border protection agency Frontex on Sept. 21 urged more support from member states, warning that "the speed and dynamics of the refugee influx continues to be exceptionally high."

A “cottage industry” has reportedly been set up on the opposite Turkish coast to manufacture bogus Syrian passports, given that holders of such documents are finding the prospect of political asylum in Europe easier.

A record 107,500 migrants crossed the European Union's borders last month, according to new figures Aug. 18, showing they are arriving in dramatically increasing numbers and creating a humanitarian crisis for the 28-nation bloc.

The corpses of 17 migrants were brought ashore in Sicily aboard an Italian naval vessel on May 31 along with 454 survivors as efforts intensified to rescue people fleeing war and poverty in Africa and the Middle East. 

Europe "collectively guilty" for drowning of migrants

PARIS -- Europe is collectively guilty of letting hundreds of migrants die in the Mediterranean, says a former French minister and founder of Doctors Without Borders.

Frontex Executive Director Fabrice Leggeri has assured Interior Minister Rumyana Bachvarova that the European border agency is ready to help Bulgaria if migratory pressures via the Black Sea increase.

Leggeri told Bachvarova that Frontex could help with the organization of more joint return flights of illegal immigrants to their home.