He recounts his perilous night-time journey with a group of friends to Kos across the narrow stretch of water from Turkey.
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Medical charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) spoke about the crisis and said it is anxious about the claims from some migrants, who say they were attacked at sea.
“It was about to sink”. I know that is more easily said than done, but there simply is no easy way out.
While tourists eat and drink at Bodrum’s upscale waterfront restaurants, migrants carrying their meager belongings in backpacks sit across the street under palm and eucalyptus trees close to huge yachts moored in Bodrum’s harbor.
The vessel is intended to ease the pressure on the island of Kos, which has found itself on the front line of the migrant crisis as people arrive in rubber dinghies at the rate of hundreds a day.
“In Europe, we take down walls, we do not put new ones”, he said, suggesting also that the same criticism applies for the fence installed around the Channel Tunnel entrances. “It is unsafe even for four people [in such a small boat] – for 15 people, it is 100 percent risky”.
Migrants, without food and water, have also been sheltering from the intense heat in tents and cardboard boxes.
“In Istanbul, they let us use the toilets for free”, said Ayman Almotlak, 31, a Syrian who teaches Arabic and made the crossing to Kos, speaking of the local merchants.
Smugglers seen organizing the departures from Fenerburnu beach refused to speak to reporters about their trade.
The IOM said Turkish efforts to stop traffickers from sending large “ghost ships” crammed with migrants towards Italy has sparked the surge in arrivals in Greece.
The deaths are not deterring migrants, many of whom have likely seen plenty of fatalities in conflicts in nations like Syria and Afghanistan.
Financially struggling Greece has reported 134,988 arrivals from Turkey this year, it said, while Italy recorded 93,540 newcomers through July. Activists were cautiously positive about the new funding for Greece, while calling for a bolder response to the migrants crisis.
At least 2,300 people have died making the crossing, according to the latest figures issued by the global Organization for Migration (IOM).
“Our understanding is that more support to Greece is on the way”.
With files from The Associated Press.
Over the weekend, a auto transporting boat was used as a makeshift reception centre for the refugees as Greek authorities struggled to cope with the influx – although critics have compared the boat to a floating prison. “In the beginning, people were welcoming them, now they’re getting exhausted”.
But other times it is poorly organized chaos.
Then they have tides, currents and Turkish coast guard patrols to contend with before they reach Kos, where they often wade ashore among tourists lying in the Sunday.
It’s after midnight on Turkey’s southern Aegean coast.
Some 124,000 refugees and migrants landed on the Greek islands during the first seven months of the year – up 750 percent from 2014, according to UN figures. “I wanted another life”, he said. So far this year, 33,180 migrants have been caught or rescued.
Meanwhile, Eurotunnel has said that the number of migrants trying to get into the terminal near Calais has fallen dramatically.
“My wife, my three children and I were smuggled out of Mosul in the back of a truck”.
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“I’ve been here nine hours and haven’t eaten anything today”. “War has spared nothing”.
