Libya finds 29 bodies of apparent migrants on beach, three drown near Greece

25 Oct 2015 / 19:07 H.
    Libya finds 29 bodies of apparent migrants on beach, three drown near Greece
    A man walks past a banner announcing an European leader's meeting on refugee flows along the Western Balkans route at the European Commission in Brussels on Oct 25, 2015. European Union and Balkan leaders hold emergency talks on Europe's refugee crisis today amid threats from three frontline states to close their borders if northern EU countries stop accepting migrants. AFP

TRIPOLI: The bodies of 29 people thought to be migrants have been discovered on beaches around a city 160km east of Tripoli, the Red Crescent said.
"Local residents told us about bodies on the beaches around Zliten," spokesman Mohamed al-Misrati said. "We discovered 25 bodies, then another four."
Misrati did not give any further details about the nationality of the deceased, but the Tripoli authorities' official news agency reported that they were from Africa.
The Red Crescent was expecting to recover several more bodies this Sunday, the press agency quoted Misrati as saying.
The North African country, with its 1,770km of poorly patrolled coastline, is a popular jumping off point for migrants seeking to reach Europe.
The most popular destination is the Italian island of Lampedusa, barely 300km away.
In ATHENS, at least three migrants — two children and a woman — drowned on Sunday when their boat sank off the Greek island of Lesbos, the coastguard said, the latest fatalities in Europe's refugee crisis.
Around a dozen others, mostly Afghans, are still missing after the rickety vessel, carrying 60 people, went down at dawn as it made the perilous crossing from Turkey, according to the Greek coastguard.
Many of those crossing the Aegean Sea from Turkey to Greece do not know how to swim and are often equipped with poor-quality life vests, the coastguard said.
A patrol boat and a helicopter operated by European border agency Frontex found the lifeless bodies of the woman and two children.
Another search operation that began last night, aimed at finding a two-year-old Afghan boy who fell into the water somewhere between Turkey and Lesbos, has so far proven fruitless.
Despite worsening weather that has made the journey from Turkey to Greece even more dangerous, a record 48,000 refugees and migrants arrived this week in Greece, most of them in Lesbos, the International Organization for Migration said Friday.
Of more than 600,000 people who have reached Europe's shores this year in the continent's worst migration crisis since World War II, some 3,000 have died. — AFP

sentifi.com

thesundaily_my Sentifi Top 10 talked about stocks