At least 79 people died when a Greece fishing boat sank which had about 750 on board. The boat which was carrying illegal immigrants as well as refugees was overcrowded, trying to reach Europe capsized and sank off the coast of Greece on Wednesday 14th of June. The boat was bound to Italy and believed to have left the Tobruk area in eastern Libya. The fishing boat was 25-30m long and its deck was full of people.
Charity Alarm Phone, which operates a trans-European network supporting rescue operations, said it received alerts from people on board a ship in distress off Greece late on Tuesday, saying 750 people were on board and so far 79 people have drowned and 104 have been rescued.
Meanwhile, Greek authorities have been criticized for not acting to rescue the migrants, even though a coast guard vessel escorted the trawler for hours and watched helplessly as it sank in minutes. In response, Greek officials argued that the migrants repeatedly refused assistance and insisted on continuing to Italy, however, Legal experts dispute that, that was no excuse.
It remains unclear how many people were missing, but some initial reports suggested hundreds may have been on board when the boat went down far from shore and many still remains missing. “The chances of finding more survivors are minimal,” retired Greek coastguard Admiral Nikos Spanos told state-run ERT television.
The UN migration agency estimated that the vessel was carrying approximately 750 people, including at least 40 children, based on interviews with survivors. That could make the shipwreck one of the deadliest recorded in the central Mediterranean.
Survivors of one of the worst disasters in the Mediterranean in recent years have told doctors and police that women and children were travelling in the hold of the vessel. The doctors at Kalamata general hospital told Greek media and the BBC that survivors said as many 100 children had been in the bottom of the ship. About 30 people were treated in hospital for pneumonia and exhaustion but were not in immediate danger, officials said, and several had been discharged.
The surviving immigrants rescued from the deadly boat sinking off the coast of southwestern Peloponnese will be transferred to the Reception and Identification Center in Malakassa, in East Attica, the Migration Ministry said on Wednesday. The ministry further stipulated that officials have been stationed in Kalamata for support and interpretation services.
The recovered victims’ bodies were transferred to a cemetery near Athens for DNA tests on Thursday. The coastguard said the search operation will continue for as long as needed and Greece has declared three days of mourning in response to the disaster.
Other nine Survivors arrested in relation to the Greece shipwreck…
On the same note, the Greece police have arrested Egyptian nationals on suspicion of belonging to the smuggling ring that arranged the deadly voyage and among the detainees was the captain of the overloaded and dilapidated vessel. However, other reports are coming in stating that the Captain died in the shipwreck.
The arrest came as a result of two days of interviews with the survivors, cross-referencing the information and honing down the possibilities of who among the survivors might have been part of the trafficking ring that profited from this enterprise. The profits that these men get are massive at the expense of these poor immigrants, seeking to better their lives.
They are being held by the coastguard in Kalamata and a public prosecutor is likely to press several charges against the group including that of mass murder.
