Migrant crisis: Bulgaria to send 1000 military personnel to Turkish border
More than 1000 Bulgarian military personnel will be deployed at the Turkish border in the coming days to help Bulgaria’s Border Police, Interior Ministry chief secretary Georgi Kostov said on September 17 2015.
The reason is the increased migration from the Turkish town of Edirne towards Bulgaria.
In the past day, the number of migrants across Bulgaria’s border with Turkey has tripled, and more than 50 people who had crossed illegally were detained on Bulgarian territory.
Kostov said that a phased deployment of up to 1000 military personnel along the entire Bulgarian-Turkish border was beginning.
“The colleagues from the army will carry out routine work in guarding the state border together with the Border Police and national police.”
He said that Bulgaria had the strength to deal with migratory pressures and the fact that the route through Bulgaria was not favoured by migrants was proof of this.
Defence Minister Nikolai Nenchev said that the ministry was ready to deploy up to 1000 troops at the Bulgarian-Turkish border if needed.
“Today we will probably send more than 50 additional people. We are ready for increase this to 160 more throughout the day,” Nenchev said.
Bulgaria’s Interior Ministry said on September 17 that the previous night, 660 refugees had tried to enter Bulgarian territory. This was compared to the average number, in previous days, which added up to between 150 and 200 people.
