Last summer, through an ad hoc registration created to enable refugees with temporary protection in Turkey to go to Syria to see family members and their homes and then come back to Turkey through legal means. A total of 53,798 refugees crossed the Oncupinar border point in the Kilis border province before August 30 to go mostly to the northern areas considered safe after the Turkish Operation Euphrates Shield. After the deadline for returning to Turkey passed, some 6,715 of them had not yet returned and thus can no longer do so. 

Local media say that most of the voluntary returns were to the cities of Jarablus, Azaz, Al-Rai, Al-Bab and Marea, as well as some areas of Aleppo. ''There is nothing better than one's own country. It will always be better than any other country,'' Rahaf, a 19-year-old Syrian, was quoted by Turkish media as saying after returning to her home country for Eid Al-Adha. 

A similar temporary permission was granted for the Eid Al-Fitr holiday in June at the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, when 100,000 refugees crossed the border. 

UNHCR has said that Turkey hosts over 3.2 million Syrian refugees, most than any other country in the world. Fewer than 10 percent of them live in refugee camps, which have mostly been set up along the border, while the others are spread out across the entire country, often in makeshift, crowded lodgings. 

Following an 'open-door' policy for several years, the Turkish-Syrian border was closed to all in 2015 barring only exceptional cases, such as the seriously wounded. Last week, Ankara launched another military intervention in Syria, in the northwestern Idlib province, as part of 'de-escalation' zones agreed with Russia an Iran during the Astana talks. The stated aim is to broaden the buffer zone under its control and curb the advance of Kurdish forces.