22 dead after Greece-bound migrant boat sinks off Turkey

Resulting from Lesbos’ close proximity to Turkey (little greater than six miles away at its nearest point), the island has grow to be probably the most very popular stepping stones to Europe for these fleeing agitation & war in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan & beyond.

Migrants and refugees wait at Istanbul’s Esenler Bus Terminal for buses to the Turkish-Greek border after authorities withheld tickets to Turkish border towns on Wednesday.

After spending a cold night under the stars and with daytime temperatures expected to soar, some families headed back to Istanbul, but many would-be migrants insisted they would seek a way to cross the border at any cost.

Scores more attempted to reach the border by vehicle or on foot.

Defending the decision to turn them back, Sahin said Edirne could not cope with the arrivals, which have exceeded 50,000 so far this year – more than the total in 2014. “We have degrees, we have education, there’s nothing for us here in Turkey“, said 25-year-old Saleh, an electronics engineer from the Syrian city of Aleppo.

Police were called to help local authority staff deal with the migrants.

IOM also reported that over this past weekend, and through the first days of this week, an estimated 72 migrants and refugees have lost their lives in their attempt to cross into the Greek islands from Turkey.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the exodus underscored the need to bring about an end to the war.

“There may be several thousand potentially very unsafe persons” among those who have arrived, he added, pointing to concerns over Islamic State militants slipping into the European Union under the guise of refugees.

September 14: Austria and Slovakia say they too are reintroducing border controls. Hungary has completed a razor-wire fence against its border to Serbia.

The real issue, he said, was “how to stop the conflict in their country as soon as possible”.

Those seeking to reach Edirne cite the case of Aylan Kurdi, the three-year-old Syrian refugee whose tiny dead body was photographed washed up on a beach in Turkey, to explain their desire to travel overland.

ReutersMigrants, mostly from Syria, sleep in a mosque at the main bus station in Istanbul, Turkey, early September 16, 2015. “We don’t want to drown”.