Surge in migrants entering EU via Western Balkans but overall numbers decline

Migrants walk on the Turkish-Greek border

Credit: Ozan KOSE/AFP

Illegal EU border crossings through the Western Balkans have more than doubled since last year while numbers have fallen sharply on the Mediterranean route, officials said on Tuesday.

The European Union’s border agency Frontex reported nearly 3,500 detections on the Western Balkan land border route in October, more than a third higher than the month before.

In the first 10 months of this year, the preliminary figures showed that over 19,700 migrants were detected — more than double the total from the same period last year.

More than half of the migrants were Syrian while Afghans accounted for another quarter, a statement said.

However, for the EU as a whole, Frontex said border crossings were down 21 percent compared to last year "largely because of a drop in arrivals in the Eastern and Western Mediterranean".

In the Western Mediterranean, the total for the first 10 months of 2020 was 13,400, or 37 percent less than in the first 10 months of 2019.

Numbers were down 75 percent for the Eastern Mediterranean — the maritime route between Turkey and Greece that has in the past been one of the main migrant passages into the EU.

Frontex has come under pressure to respond to media allegations that its guards have been working with Greek authorities to push migrants back into Turkish waters.

Migrant rights agencies have warned that the arrivals, many of them refugees from conflict, have a right to claim asylum and are put in danger by aggressive tactics from border guards.