Turkey on Monday seized 82 migrants in the back of a truck in the coastal town of Ayvacik.
News agency IHA said the migrants were from Afghanistan and intended to travel to Europe by sea. They were sent to repatriation centers for deportation.
Mediterranean Sea arrivals into the European Union, including migrants making the longer and more perilous crossing from north Africa to Italy, totalled 172,301 in 2017, down from 362,753 in 2016 and over a million in 2015, according to U.N. data.
Numbers declined sharply since 2015 after Turkey, in exchange for 3 billion euros ($3.3 billion) in European Union aid and a promise to ease visa restrictions for Turks, began to exert more control on migrants trying to cross to the EU via its territory.
Yet many still attempt the perilous trip and Turkey remains one of the main launch points.
