The European Union's border protection agency Frontex said that illegal border crossings into the bloc increased by 17% to 380,000 last year over 2022, hitting the highest level in almost a decade.

The EU border agency said in a statement there was a "significant rise in irregular border crossings in 2023," to the highest annual total since 2016.

It "constitutes a 17 percent increase from the figures in 2022, indicating a consistent upward trend over the past three years," the Warsaw-based agency added.

Frontex said its preliminary calculations indicated about 41% of the 380,000 detected entries went through the Central Mediterranean route.

Another 26% went through the Western Balkans, while 16 percent took the Eastern Mediterranean route.

"Syrians accounted for over 100,000 irregular crossings last year, the highest number among all nationalities. They were followed by Guineans and Afghans," Frontex said.

The agency said women accounted for one in 10 of the crossings, while the share of reported minors accounted for another 10%.