In remarks to Daily Sabah, a Turkish official on Sunday evening refuted Greek claims that only 73 migrants have crossed into Europe so far, providing footage from the border of migrants crossing.
In multiple videos captured in different areas, scores of refugees are seen crossing the Maritsa River on boats.
“It has come to my attention that the Greek foreign ministry has accused Turkey of engaging in a disinformation campaign regarding the number of refugees who have crossed into EU territory,” the official said on condition of anonymity.
“According to media reports, our Greek friends seem to believe that only 73 refugees have reached their territory. Obviously, we have no reason to believe that Greek officials would deliberately mislead their citizens and the international public about the gravity of the situation,” he added.
“Therefore, I wanted to share some images and video footage with you that cast serious doubt about the data available to the Greek foreign ministry,” the official said.
Over 100,000 migrants have crossed the Turkish border from the northwesternmost province of Edirne to Greece and Bulgaria since Friday, Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu said earlier Sunday.
In a statement on his official Twitter account, Soylu updated the figure to 100,577 as of 7:40 p.m. local time from 47,000 from a day earlier.
Turkish authorities announced that they would no longer prevent the stem the flow of migrants who wanted to reach Europe.
The decision was made after 36 Turkish soldiers were killed by Bashar Assad regime forces in Idlib, northwestern Syria. The Turkish soldiers were deployed to the region to protect local civilians under a 2018 deal with Russia under which acts of aggression are prohibited.
Since then, thousands of irregular migrants have flocked to Edirne to make their way into Europe.
Turkey already hosts some 3.7 million migrants from Syria alone, more than any other country in the world.
Ankara has repeatedly complained that Europe has failed to keep its promises to help migrants and stem further migrant waves.
