syria refugees
© EUTERS/ Murad Sezer
Some 50,000 Syrian refugees are moving towards the Turkish border, Turkey's Minister of European Union Affairs Volkan Bozkir said Thursday,

According to the official, quoted by the local Daily Sabah newspaper, the number of new refugee arrivals from Syria could reach 1.5 million if the city of Aleppo is "completely bombed out."

Turkey hosts over 2 million of Syrian migrants, who fled across the border to escape violence in their home country. Syria has been locked in an armed conflict involving various opposition factions and radical Islamist militant groups for almost five years.

According to UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Raad Hussein, since the latest offensive against the extremists by the Syrian government forces began last week in the Aleppo province bordering Turkey, some 51,000 civilians have been displaced and a further 300,000 are at risk of being placed under siege.