Police in the Turkish city of Istanbul say they have arrested more than 1000 people who they suspect were trying to migrate abroad illegally. It is the latest in a series of similar operations carried out in the city after two boatloads of migrants arrived in Italy in the last few weeks. Chris Morris reports from the Turkish capital, Ankara;

In a series of overnight raids the Istanbul police arrested more than 1000 people, most of them foreigners apparently migrating through Turkey to try to reach Europe. The city suburbs are full of cheap hotels and boarding houses where would-be migrants from many countries wait for their chance to flee abroad.

Many of them are Kurds from Turkey, Iraq and Iran. Others come from as far as Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

Turkey has been a centre of migrant smuggling for several years but European attention has only been seriously focused on the problem in the last few weeks. Turkey says the migrants are motivated by economic hardship and it refuses to accept arguments made in Europe that Turkey's war against Kurdish rebels is a major cause of the exodus.

The Turkish authorities have been arresting hundreds of foreigners in Istanbul to try to emphasise the international dimension of the smuggling trade. Turkey's chief-of-police met several of his European counterparts in Rome last week to try to co-ordinate a plan of action against migrant smugglers.