Migrant Smuggling Data and Research

Figure 6.1: Migrant routes in the Mediterranean region, 2016
Source: IOM Missing Migrants project (www.reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/
Migrant_Routes_Mediterranean_2016_16_Feb.pdf)
As seen in other parts of the world, there are two major organizational
structures of smuggling networks in Turkey and its immediate neighbourhood:
(a) the mafia-type, with higher charges and which is relatively less prevalent in
the region; (b) more informal smuggling networks, which is more widespread
and less costly than the first. Earlier research indicates that smuggling networks
operate in a complicated manner with different actors assuming different roles
(see İçduygu and Toktaş, 2002:36–45). The existence of migrants’ social networks
(kin and friends living in destination countries and wide web of human smuggling
networks operating in Turkey and beyond) is also effective in determining the
next phase of the migration journey heading Europe and even finance border
crossing with migrant smugglers. 41 These social local and transnational networks
are very fluid and changing depending on the availability of limited resources and
other variables at the macro, meso and microlevels (see Akcapar, 2010; Wissink,
Düvell and van Eerdewijk, 2013). Apart from these two types of organizational
structures in migrant smuggling, there is anecdotal evidence that some migrants
initiate their own journey across the Aegean, especially after the recent mass
influx of refugees from the Middle East and South Asia into Turkey.
41
Turkish newspapers also report that some opportunistic people from the Turkish security forces may consent
or extend help to smugglers in exchange for monetary gain.
144
6. Turkey