Turkish border guards shoot refugees, says Amnesty International

Turkish guards shoot at refugees based on what they say are safety measures

Turkish guards shoot at Syrian refugees stranded at the border on a daily basis, a researcher at Amnesty International has told RT.

According to Andrew Gardner, these cases are not isolated and the organization has been collecting evidence since 2014.

“There have been many reports of incidents on the border. We collected information on this as early as 2014, when we received many reports of people being shot when they were trying to cross the border irregularly,” Gardner said.

He added that the current situation in war-torn Syria has led to a spike in the number of migrants being assaulted by Turkish border guards.

As Gardner states, Turkish guards shoot at refugees based on what they say are safety measures.

“What the Turkish parties have told us is that they don’t know who these people are, that people could be members of armed groups, they could be smugglers,” he said.

Gardner also stated that the only way to resolve the problem of the migrant flow was to make legal crossing points for refugees on the border with Turkey, and said Ankara “should not have to hold the responsibility for hosting refugees alone.”