"Our brothers in the Caucasus and our compatriots in the Balkans have always taken refuge in Turkey when they are in trouble."

APA's Istanbul correspondent reports that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said this during a video address to the opening of the Global Parliamentary Conference organized by the Turkish Grand National Assembly and the Inter-Parliamentary Union.

He noted that Turkey has hosted the largest number of refugees in the world for the past seven years.

"I hope that we will continue to fulfill this task set by our history, culture and faith.

Today, with the greatest human activity since World War II, no one can escape responsibility.

Recently, about 30,000 immigrants, mostly women and children, have died in the Mediterranean.

The whereabouts and fate of tens of thousands of abducted Syrian children who took refuge in Europe are unknown.

"Almost every day we witness the plight of refugees who are being persecuted, robbed, beaten and even killed by Greek security forces," Erdogan said.