Yet another boat carrying immigrants to Greece has capsized off Turkey’s western coast, leaving at least 39 people dead, according to Turkish news agency Anadolu. Five children were among the dead, said the Turkish coast guard.
While 75 people aboard the crumbling boat were rescued, the mayor of Ayvacık Mehmet Ünal Şahin expressed fears, according to CNN-Turk TV, that “the numbers will rise as divers continue the search.” The mayor added that “local people woke up to the sound of screaming migrants.”
The boat was heading toward the Greek island of Lesbos when it capsized. The victims were from Syria, Afghanistan, and Myanmar.
More than 250 people have drowned since January alone while trying to cross the Aegean Sea on their way to Europe.
According to an Associated News report published in today’s The Telegraph, “The International Organization for Migration says drowning deaths are running at four times the rate of 2015, when many thousands daily sought to enter the European Union via Turkey by reaching one of more than a dozen offshore Greek islands, particularly nearby Lesbos.”
Worse still, there seems to be no end in sight for Europe’s refugee/migrant crisis. In fact, millions more are expected to reach the continent in the next couple of years, so drowning bodies in the Aegean Sea will most likely become an even more common sight.
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