Greece’s Coast Guard announced that eight migrants—six minors and two women—died on Monday after two boats sank in separate incidents near the island of Samos in the Aegean Sea.
The coastguard said nearly 40 people had been rescued on Samos, and a search for survivors was ongoing amid strong winds. An official said a non-governmental organization alerted authorities and that it was believed that about 50 people were on board the vessel.
Maritime and Insular Policy Minister Christos Stylianides expressed deep sorrow over the tragedy and blamed human traffickers.
In his statement, Stylianides underscored that putting “an end to this unacceptable system of traffickers” remains a non-negotiable goal for his ministry, the Hellenic Coast Guard, and himself personally.
“This tragic incident once again highlights the criminal actions of trafficking networks and their accomplices, who prioritize profit over the lives of innocent people, even young children,” Stylianides said.
He emphasized that addressing migration flows and tackling trafficking networks requires systematic and joint cooperation at the maritime borders between Greece and Turkey, a collaboration already yielding tangible results.
“We are equally determined to confront—and we will confront—the major challenge of illegal migration, which now exceeds the endurance limits of the European Union as a whole,” he added.
More than 50,000 migrants have arrived in Greece this year
Samos is just off the Turkish coast and has long been a regular destination for migrants trying to reach European soil.
More than 50,000 migrants have arrived in Greece by boat so far this year, making it the second most used European migrant route, second only to Italy.
According to data from the United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, migrant arrivals have been steadily declining since August 2023 but have increased again since summer.
About 160,000 migrants have arrived in Europe by sea this year, agency figures show, while 2,000 people were dead or missing. Around 23 percent of arrivals were children.
The Greek Coast Guard is rescuing migrants trying to cross almost daily. In late October, it rescued dozens of migrants whose boat had capsized near the island of Samos.
In a separate incident in September, Greek authorities rescued more than 150 migrants in three different operations in the Aegean Sea within a 24-hour period.
One of these operations involved the recovery of a woman’s body from the sea near the Greek island of Kos, where a boat carrying sixteen migrants had capsized. The remaining fifteen individuals were safely rescued and transported to the island’s port.
In another incident, a wooden boat carrying 78 people on board was located 23 nautical miles south of Gavdos, Greece’s southernmost island. These migrants were picked up by a lifeboat and taken to the port of Souda on Crete.
The third operation involved a sailing boat carrying 70 migrants, spotted east of the Messinian Gulf in the southern Peloponnese.
According to data from the Greek Coast Guard, in August 2024, 2,840 migrants were arrested for illegal entry into Greece. Of these, nineteen were identified on Greek territory and destined for other EU member-states.
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