AlQa'dah 27, 1436, September 11, 2015, SPA -- The International Organization for Migration (IOM) said Friday that more than 430,000 refugees and migrants have crossed the Mediterranean to Europe so far this year, a record number more than double the total for all of last year. The IOM said that a record 432,761 refugees and migrants were now estimated to have made the perilous journey across the Mediterranean to Europe so far in 2015, while 2,748 have drowned. The agency said that an estimated 309,356 people had arrived by sea in Greece as of September 10, with another 121,139 arriving in Italy, 2,166 in Spain, and 100 in Malta. This was a record compared with 197,940 people who arrived by sea in those four European countries in all of 2014, according to IOM spokesperson Daniel Szabo. The U.N. refugee agency (UNHCR), meanwhile, called for decent mass reception centers to be set up immediately in Greece, Italy, and Hungary, on the front lines of a huge influx of refugees being received in "appalling conditions." UNHCR welcomed an EU proposal to share out 160,000 refugees and an offer by Washington to take 10,000 Syrians over the next year, but said "the United States could and should do much more." The agency is sending prefabricated housing units to provide temporary overnight shelter for 300 families in Hungary, a country that is building a 175-kilometer fence along its southern border with Serbia to stem the flow of people trekking north, many aiming for Germany. "We are stepping up operations in Europe, including Hungary," UNHCR spokesperson William Spindler told reporters. Spindler said that 50 pre-fabricated family homes also have arrived on the Greek island of Lesbos, and a further 300 are being sent to nearby Kos, while 50 have arrived in Macedonia.
