ANKARA
In recent years, Ankara has adopted a host of security measures focusing on border regions to prevent entry of foreign fighters in transit to join terrorist organizations in Syria.
According to the Prime Minister’s Office of Public Diplomacy, which shared official factsheets with Anadolu Agency on Thursday, the measures serve the preemptive goal of stemming the flow at the earliest stage possible. The office says Turkish authorities have defined it as a primary goal to get hold of militants as they try to enter Turkey.
The measures indicate a multi-pronged approach, including the establishment of Risk Analysis Units at custom gates and transportation centers. The units, which are currently in use, aim to bolster capacity for security checks on incomers.
More than 3,000 foreigners have been screened by the Risk Analysis Units on suspicion, over a thousand of them have been denied entry and 300 deported after being identified in Turkish soil.
In 2011, Turkish officials began keeping a restricted list. Based on the practice, nearly 16,000 people from 108 countries have been barred from entering Turkey.
Fifty percent of those who were on the list were from the North Africa and Middle East, and 23 percent from North America and Europe, while 23 percent of them were identified as having Eastern European and Asian origin.
Security forces also keep a tight rein on those who entered legally. More than 600 suspected foreign fighters from 83 countries have been arrested and deported this year. This number was about 520 in 2014 and reached 570 for the first half of 2015.
At the border, the Turkish Armed Forces are taking extra measures to prevent foreigners from joining clashes in Syria.
Troops have dug 365 kilometer long ditches, and a 270 kilometer stretch on the border has been illuminated to make patrolling more effective. Additionally, 1,280 kilometer long patrol roads have been improved.
Turkey has also fortified its border region by deploying personnel and vehicles on the Syrian border.
Currently, half of the 40.000 soldiers who are protecting the country's borders are working on the Syrian border, and half of the armored vehicles and 90 percent of unmanned air vehicles and manned exploration aircraft belonging to the border units have been sent there.
Thanks to these measures, over 102,000 people were detained from January 1 till July 14, 2015 while trying to illegally cross the Turkey-Syria border. 724 among them are suspected foreign fighters coming from third world countries.
Since the early stages of the Syrian civil war, Turkey has adopted an open-door policy for civilians fleeing the conflict in both Syria and Iraq. It has given refuge to at least 1.8 million Syrians and 200.000 Iraqis.
Turkey shares a 900 kilometer border with its neighbor and has received nearly two million refugees from the south.
Syria has been gripped by violence since the Assad regime launched a violent crackdown on anti-government demonstrations that erupted in early 2011.
A brutal crackdown quickly triggered a civil war in which more than 220,000 people have since been killed in fierce fighting between pro-regime forces and heavily-armed opposition groups, according to U.N. figures.
