(MENAFN- Gulf Times) Seventeen migrants drowned yesterday when their boat sank in Turkish waters on its way to Greece, local media reported, while the Italian coastguard said it had rescued some 500 migrants in the Mediterranean this weekend.
The bodies of the dead Syrians € including five children € were discovered by the Turkish coastguard inside the cabin of their wooden boat, which had set off from the holiday resort town of Bodrum for the Greek island of Leros, the Dogan news agency reported.
Another 20 migrants, who were on the boat's deck and had been wearing life jackets, survived and swam back to the Turkish coast, Dogan said.
They were taken to a morgue in Bodrum to identify their drowned relatives.
Among the dead was a three-year-old boy named Yusuf, who was identified by his grief-stricken Syrian father, state news agency Anatolia said.
The tragedy came as the Italian coastguard launched seven operations in the Mediterranean over the weekend, plucking some 500 migrants from the water.
A coastguard spokesman told AFP yesterday that four of the rescue operations had already wound up but the others were ongoing.
"Saturday was quiet on the whole but now there is further movement," he said. "We have had several interventions € one by a ship belonging to (medical charity) MSF, two coastguard units as well as an Italian naval ship and a ship belonging to EU Navfor Med," he said.
The EU Navfor Med is a military operation launched at the end of June to identify, capture and dispose of vessels and rescue migrants undertaking risky journeys in a desperate bid to try and get to Europe from war-ravaged Syria and other trouble spots.
The mission is equipped with four ships, including an Italian aircraft carrier, and four planes. It is manned by 1,318 troops from 22 European countries.
A German frigate named Werra and an MSF (Doctors Without Borders) ship rescued 140 people from a giant dinghy on Saturday afternoon, according to an AFP photographer.
The migrants mainly came from the west African countries of Nigeria, Ghana, Senegal and Sierra Leone and left Libya three days earlier.
They were rescued about 80km off the Libyan coast.
EU leaders have agreed to boost aid for Syria's neighbours, including $1bn through UN agencies, in a bid to mitigate the refugee influx into Europe.
EU interiors ministers also pushed through a deal this week to relocate 120,000 refugees despite fierce opposition from central and eastern European states.
Some 500,000 people have come to Europe so far this year, the International Organisation for Migration says, many of them taking perilous journeys across the Mediterranean on inflatable dinghies.
More than 2,800 people have died or disappeared making the crossing since January.
Most of those setting sail across the Mediterranean € before embarking on a gruelling land journey through the Balkans towards western Europe € are fleeing conflict and poverty in Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Africa.
In Greece, police said yesterday that an average of 5,500 migrants are crossing the border with Macedonia everyday on their journey north.
Legal Disclaimer:
MENAFN provides the information “as is” without warranty of any kind. We do not accept any responsibility or liability for the accuracy, content, images, videos, licenses, completeness, legality, or reliability of the information contained in this article. If you have any complaints or copyright issues related to this article, kindly contact the provider above.