Hundreds of migrants walked through northwest Turkey toward its borders with Greece and Bulgaria on Friday, Turkish media reported, after a senior official said Ankara will no longer stop Syrian refugees from reaching Europe.
On Thursday, Turkey said 33 Turkish soldiers were killed in an air strike by Syrian government forces in Syria's northwestern Idlib region on Thursday.
The official subsequently told Reuters Turkish police, coastguard and border security officials had been ordered to stand down on refugees' land and sea crossings towards Europe in anticipation of the imminent arrival of refugees from Idlib.
Demiroren news agency said there were around 300 migrants, including women and children, in the group which began heading towards the borders between the two European Union countries and Turkey's Edirne province at around midnight.