Three FRAN indicators – detections of illegal border-crossing between border crossing points, detections of illegal stay and asylum applications – surged in the third quarter of 2015 to reach their highest levels ever recorded. This was in large part related to the unprecedented number of migrants arriving on the Greek islands in 2015.
The vast majority of detections of illegal border-crossing were made on the Eastern Mediterranean and Western Balkan routes. Most of the people who had entered the EU through one of the Greek islands were recorded for the second time when they passed through the Western Balkans, re-entering the EU across the Serbia-Croatia border.
Meanwhile, the number of migrants using the Central Mediterranean route in the third quarter fell by nearly a fifth. However, while the number of Syrians using this route dropped considerably, detections of many African nationalities, including Nigerians and Somalis, were substantially higher than in the same period of 2014.
FRAN Quarterly reports are prepared by the Frontex Risk Analysis Unit to provide a regular overview of irregular migration at the EU external borders, based on the irregular migration data exchanged among Member State border-control authorities.