Nearly 30 migrants were feared missing off the Greek island of Lesbos, Greek Coast Guard officials said yesterday, in the latest boat sinking in an ongoing Aegean Sea tragedy that has cost hundreds of lives.
The coast guard said it had rescued 20 people spotted in the water by a helicopter from EU border agency Frontex, but those picked up said another 26 people had been in the boat.
The state news agency ANA said there were children among those missing.
Photo: Reuters
The coast guard declined to comment.
On Saturday, a five-year-old Syrian girl died in another attempted crossing from Turkey to Greece and there was no news on another dozen people who were in the boat with her.
The accident again occurred east of the island of Lesbos, one of the Greek islands that has seen a heavy influx of refugees from war-torn Syria this year.
Many have perished trying to cross the Aegean Sea in search of a better future in Europe.
Earlier this month, harrowing pictures of three-year-old Syrian refugee Aylan Kurdi, whose body was found washed up on a Turkish beach after the boat carrying his family to the Greek island of Kos sank, caused an outpouring of emotion around the world, pressuring European leaders to step up their response to the refugee crisis.
The body of another four-year-old Syrian girl washed up on a beach in western Turkey on Friday.
Migrants have in recent days turned to Turkey’s land borders with Greece and Bulgaria to avoid the dangerous sea voyage, which has cost more than 2,600 people their lives in the Mediterranean this year.
Greece has seen more than 300,000 refugees and migrants enter the country this year.
Most of them pass through Greece and on to other European nations.
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