Turkey intensifies border control to crackdown smugglers

A total of 51,107 soldiers were stationed in 317 guardhouses to protect Turkey's borders with neighboring countries from smuggling, said a military statement on Monday. Several large-scale anti-smuggling operations were currently carried out in southern Turkey along the Syrian border, said the written statement published on the website of the General Staff of the Turkish Armed Forces. On Friday, a confrontation between Turkish troops and over 3, 000 smugglers in the province of Hatay lasted for hours, said the military, without elaborating further. In another incident earlier this month, 18 Turkish soldiers were injured when a group of smugglers attempting to bring diesel fuel from neighboring Syria into Turkey through a village in Hatay 's Reyhanli town set the diesel on fire.