LJUBLJANA, May 17 (Xinhua) -- Slovenian police have handled 1,567 cases of people crossing the border illegally by May 14 this year, several times more than during the same period a year ago, the Slovenian Press Agency STA reported on Thursday.

In the first four months of the year, the Slovenian police handled 1,226 cases of illegal border crossing, compared with 322 for the same period a year ago, the report said.

Nearly half of those cases were registered by the Koper Police Administration and one third by their Novo Mesto counterparts. Both are responsible for patrolling the border with Croatia.

Of the migrants entering the country illegally between January and the end of April, 283 were Algerians, 237 Pakistanis, 98 Moroccans, 88 Syrians and 77 were Afghans.

In the first four months of 2017, of the 322 crossing the border illegally, most (73) were from Afghanistan.

By April this year, Slovenian authorities returned 261 migrants to foreign authorities, compared with 274 in the same period a year ago.