“IOM, the UN Migration Agency, reports that 69,574 migrants and refugees entered Europe by sea in 2017 through May 28,” the IOM said in a statement on Tuesday, Sputnik reported.
The majority of refugees, almost 59,000 people, have landed in Italy while 1,481 people died en route to the country, according to the IOM.
The IOM also registered 7,043 migrants’ arrivals in Greece, 3,314 arrivals in Spain and 273 more in Cyprus.
Since 2015, Europe has been experiencing an acute migration crisis and struggling to accommodate hundreds of thousands of people fleeing hostilities and poverty in the Middle Eastern and North African countries. Over 360,000 migrants and refugees arrived to Europe via the Mediterranean Sea in 2016, according to IOM figures.