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Greece deploys its military on the border with Turkey to prevent thousands of migrants from entering the European Union, and suspends all asylum applications for a month while also vowing to deport any migrants who enter Greek territory illegally.
2020-03-1

European Union leaders offer Turkey a detailed package of cash and incentives to agree that all migrants attempting to cross the Aegean Sea by raft or boat would be sent back to Turkey which, in effect, becomes the region's migrant holding center. A number of stumbling blocks remain, such as raising the amount of aid from 3 billion euros to at least 6 billion euros; reducing the "72 arduous conditions" the Turks must meet to implement visa-free travel for Turkish citizens; Europe agrees to accelerate talks with Ankara on its EU bid; etc. Human Rights Watch protests the proposed fast-track collective expulsions that fail to take individual circumstances into account and breach peoples' right to seek asylum.
2016-03-18

The leaders plan to give Turkey €3bn to take back thousands who don't qualify for asylum.
2016-03-7

At least 25 migrants, including 10 children, drown after their wooden boat capsizes in the Aegean Sea near the seaside town of Didim, Turkey. The Turkish Coast Guard was able to rescue 15 people.
2016-03-6

NATO, during a two-day meeting, considers request from Turkey and Greece to monitor migrant transit in the Aegean Sea and to combat human traffickers squeezing refugees onto unsafe boats.
2016-02-10

A boat carrying Iraqi Kurd migrants sinks off the Greek island of Samos in the Aegean Sea off Turkey's Anatolian coast, killing at least 24 people, including several children, with 11 others missing.
2016-01-28

Turkey's state-run Anadolu Agency reports 11 migrants, including three children, drowned, and the Turkish coast guard rescued seven Syrians from a capsized boat headed to the Greek island of Samos.
2015-12-22

Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras lashes out at European "ineptness" in handling the continent's massive immigration crisis. The Associated Press reports 31 more people — mostly children — drowned in shipwrecks in the Mediterranean Sea near the islands of Kalymnos and Rhodes. Turkey's state-run agency says four children drowned and two others are missing after two new accidents with boats headed to Greece's Lesbos and Samos islands. The death toll in the Aegean Sea over the past three days is at least 50. The Greek coast guard says they rescued 600 people in the past 24 hours, while thousands more made it safely from Turkey to Greece's southeastern islands.
2015-10-30

Human Rights Watch says unidentified armed men have been disabling boats carrying migrants and asylum seekers in the Aegean Sea traveling from Turkey toward the Greek islands. Witnesses have described eight incidents this month in which masked assailants intercepted and disabled the boats by damaging engines or fuel systems, and in the case of inflatable boats, attempting to puncture hulls.
2015-10-22

In a pair of incidents on Tuesday and Wednesday, two migrants were killed, 16 are missing, and 48 were rescued from boats heading to Greece from Turkey that capsized in the Aegean Sea.
2015-10-22