LIVE BLOG: Refugee crisis in Europe

A total of 437,384 asylum applications were made to EU countries in 2015 alone

In 2014, only 184,665 applications were approved. The main nationalities granted asylum were Syrian, Eritrean, Afghan, Iraqi and Iranian. 

Several hundred migrants stranded for days at Budapest's main train station left the building on Friday, intent on walking to the Austrian border, according to an AFP journalist on the scene.

They were part of an estimated 2,000 migrants stuck in makeshift refugee camps at Keleti station, after railway authorities had blocked them from boarding trains to Austria and Germany.

Since 2014 there has been an upsurge in the number of refugees who have drowed in the Mediterranean Sea while attempting to reach Europe. 

Here is an infographic detailing the number of refugee deaths throughout 2014 - 2015.

The UN has said that the UK has agreed to take in 4,000 Syrian refugees. 

"We obviously welcome very much the move to increase resettlement spaces for Syrians in the UK. Those spaces are going to be critical to the lives and future of 4,000 people,” spokesperson Melissa Fleming told AP on Friday. 

“We certainly believe that there’s the momentum here” for other countries to follow suit."

Earlier, British Prime Minister David Cameron had only said that his country would take “thousands” more people, on top of the 5,000 already announced, and would give details next week.

His office has so far declined to comment on the UN figure. 

Hungary has closed the Roszke border crossing with Serbia after 300 migrants and refugees escape from a refugee camp.

Hungary has previously closed the border for short periods of time. It is unclear how long the border will remain closed.

At least 300 refugees have escaped from a Hungarian refugee camp near the Serbian border, reported Conflict News, a media platform that breaks news on conlicts around the world. 

The Sydney Morning Herald has run an obituary today for three-year-old Aylan Kurdi:

At least 30 refugees and migrants are feared drowned off the coast of Libya today, acccording to the International Organization for Migration.

More than 2,300 people have died at sea trying to reach Europe since January, according to the IOM.

Hans Rosling, a professor of global health at Sweden's Karolinska Institute, explains in this video why refugees choose to try to enter the EU by boat:

UK Prime Minister David Cameron, speaking from Lisbon where he is meeting with European leaders, has said the UK will take in 'thousands more Syrian refugees' from camps at Syria's borders.

"Britain will act with its head and its heart, providing refuge for those in need while working on long term solutions to this crisis," Cameron said in his speech.

"That means bringing to an end the conflicts that are driving so many to flee, including the bloodbath that has engulfed Syria.”

Since the Syrian civil war began in 2011, the UK has taken in around 5,000 refugees from the country.

Cameron, who said earlier this week that resettling people was not the answer to the EU's refugee crisis, has come under pressure over the past 24 hours from UK politicians across the spectrum.

Egyptian telecoms giant Naguib Sawaris has offered to buy a Greek or Italian island to shelter Syrian refugees and others fleeing conflict.

"You have dozens of islands which are deserted and could accommodate hundreds of thousands of refugees," Sawaris said this week.

He estimated that the island itself would cost between $10mn and $100mn. The bulk of the project's costs would come from building new houses, hospitals and schools and other infrastructure, he said.

MEE's Mary Atkinson is in Recklinghausen, a small town in northwestern Germany, talking to locals about the influx of refugees and migrants arriving in their country.

A 50-year-old woman named Sandra, who is currently looking for work, said the German goverment's coordination on the ground for refugees is lacking:

"The way the government is dealing with things is shit, totally shit. There is absolutely no coordination between the organisations in different towns. Where I live, there are no refugees, and practically not even any foreigners. But in another part of town there's a district we call 'Little Istanbul' because so many foreigners live there. But we never see them - they go to school and come home. There's no integration, and they just end up isolated and mistrust grows between the communities.

"My wish is simply that there was more help for the refugees. I can't bring myself to look at the news at the moment. What's going on in Hungary, little children dying... I can't bear to turn on the TV to see that."

Abdullah Kurdi has reportedly returned to Kobane to bury his two sons and wife who drowned at sea on Wednesday while trying to reach Greece.

Kurdi arrived at the Turkish border town of Suruc this morning with the funeral caskets of his family members and crossed back into Syria, leaving a convoy of journalists and activists at the border.

On Thursday, Kurdi told reporters outside the mortuary where the bodies of his family members were held that he no longer wanted to continue his journey to Europe.

“I just want to see my children for the last time and stay forever with them," Kurdi said, who also described their harrowing journey:

UN High Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres has called today for the EU to admit up to 200,000 refugees as part of a "mass relocation programme" that would be binding on EU states.

"People who are found to have a valid protection claim... must then benefit from a mass relocation programme, with the mandatory participation of all EU member states," Guterres said in a statement.

EU foreign ministers are scheduled to meet later today to discuss the refugee crisis. 

"Europe cannot go on responding to this crisis with a piecemeal or incremental approach," Guterres said. "No country can do it alone, and no country can refuse to do its part."

His appeal tallied with a call by France and Germany for binding EU quotas to share the burden of the influx of migrants and refugees, which has hit Greece, Italy and transit countries in southeastern and central Europe the hardest.

A day after Hungarian police stopped an Austrian-bound train and attempted to get passengers on buses to refugee camps, the standoff between the refugees and migrants on the train and police continues.

The head of Hungarian police border control, Col. Laszlo Balazs, told the Associated Press that 500 passengers have refused to go to a nearby camp in the town of Bicske.

Sixteen others voluntarily checked into an asylum centre yesterday, Balazs said.

Yesterday, police tried to force the passengers off the train when a woman, carrying a small baby, fell on the railway lines, enflaming anger amongst those on the train: