Greek coast guard defends actions as over 500 migrants heading for Europe feared useless in wreck

By Associated Press: The Greek coast guard on Friday (native time) defended its response to a ship that went down off the nation’s south coast and left greater than 500 migrants presumed drowned. Criticism mounted over Europe’s yearslong failure to stop such tragedies.

Patrol boats and a helicopter spent a 3rd day scouring the realm of the Mediterranean Sea the place the packed fishing vessel capsized early on Wednesday, in what the UN migration company mentioned may very well be the second deadliest migrant shipwreck recorded. The deadliest occurred when a vessel capsized off the coast of Libya en path to Italy in April 2015, killing an estimated 1,100 folks.

Greek coast guard spokesman Nikos Alexiou mentioned that each coast guard and personal ships repeatedly provided by radio and loudspeaker to assist the vessel on Wednesday whereas it was in worldwide waters, additionally heading from Libya to Italy, however they have been rejected.

Alexiou argued that any effort to tow the overcrowded trawler or transfer a whole bunch of unwilling folks onto close by ships would have been too harmful.

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“Îåou will have a disturbance, and the people will surge, which, unfortunately, is what happened in the end,” Alexiou advised state-run ERT TV. “You will have caused the accident.”

Alexiou additionally mentioned that, after accepting meals from a service provider ship, the trawler’s passengers rejected a rope bringing extra from a second service provider ship “because they thought the whole process was a way for us to take them to Greece”.

Greek authorities despatched the primary ship, the tanker Lucky Sailor, to offer the migrants meals and water. The firm managing the tanker mentioned on Friday that the folks on board “were very hesitant to receive any assistance, and at any attempt of approach the boat started to manoeuvre away”.

Eastern Mediterranean Maritime Limited mentioned in an announcement that the folks on the trawler have been ultimately persuaded to simply accept provides.

Experts mentioned maritime legislation obligated Greek authorities to try a rescue.

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They undoubtedly “had a duty to start rescue procedures” given the situation of the vessel, mentioned Professor Erik R¸sæg of the University of Oslo’s Institute of Private Law. He mentioned a refusal of help could be overruled if deemed unreasonable, because it appeared to have been on Wednesday.

Flavio Di Giacomo of the Mediterranean workplace of the UN migration company International Organisation for Migration (IOM) tweeted that each one migrant boats must be thought of harmful and rescued instantly as a result of “even when they appear to have no problems, in a few minutes they can sink”.

Rescuers pulled 104 survivors from the water and later recovered 78 our bodies however haven’t situated any extra since late Wednesday. The Greek coast guard mentioned the search-and-rescue operation would proceed past the usual 72 hours.

The UN’s migration and refugee companies issued a joint assertion calling well timed maritime search and rescues “a legal and humanitarian imperative” and calling for “urgent and decisive action to prevent further deaths at sea”.

A bunch of non-governmental organisations, together with Amnesty International and Doctors Without Borders, mentioned the EU ought to “stop seeing solutions solely in the dismantling” of smuggling networks, and arrange state-led search-and-rescue operations within the Mediterranean.

“The Greek government had specific responsibilities toward every passenger on the vessel, which was clearly in distress,” Adriana Tidona of Amnesty International mentioned. “This is a tragedy of unimaginable proportions, all the more so because it was entirely preventable.”

Greece and different southern EU nations, which generally are the primary locations for Europe-bound asylum-seekers travelling by sea, have toughened border safety measures lately, extending partitions and intensifying maritime patrols.

“This is a European problem. I think it’s time for Europe to be able, in solidarity, to define an effective migration policy for these kinds of situations not to happen again,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres mentioned throughout a information convention at UN headquarters in New York late on Thursday.

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The EU’s govt fee says the 27-nation bloc is near an settlement on how member nations can share duty in caring for migrants and refugees who undertake the harmful journey throughout the Mediterranean.

A judicial investigation can also be underway into the causes of the sinking. Greek officers say the vessel capsized minutes after it misplaced energy, speculating that panic among the many passengers might have precipitated the boat to record and roll over.

Most of the survivors have been being moved on Friday from a storage hangar on the southern port of Kalamata, the place family members additionally gathered to search for family members, to migrant shelters close to Athens.

Abdo Sheikhi, a Kurdish Syrian residing in Germany, travelled to Kalamata to search out out what occurred to 5 relations who have been on the boat.

On Friday, he found that solely his youthful brother Ali and one other relative had survived. He managed to talk on the telephone to Ali, who had been moved to the camp close to Athens.

“(Ali) told me he jumped (off the) ship while the others could not jump,” Sheikhi mentioned. “They were scared. They were holding on to the boat as it swayed.”

Nine folks — all males from Egypt, ranging in age from 20 to 40 — have been arrested and detained and charged on Friday of individuals smuggling and collaborating in a felony enterprise. Twenty-seven of the survivors stay hospitalised, well being officers mentioned. The smuggling suspects are because of seem in court docket on June 19 (Monday).

The IOM has estimated the boat carried as many as 750 folks, and UN human rights workplace spokesman Jeremy Laurence mentioned the lacking included “large numbers of women and children”.

The survivors have been all boys and males from Egypt, Pakistan, Syria and the Palestinian territories. Alexiou, citing survivor accounts, mentioned passengers within the maintain of the fishing boat included girls and youngsters however that the variety of lacking, believed to be within the a whole bunch, nonetheless remained unclear.

Officials at a state-run morgue exterior Athens photographed the faces of the victims and gathered DNA samples to start out the identification course of.

Late Friday, Greece’s coast guard mentioned a navy helicopter situated a sailboat with migrants off southwestern Greece after being alerted by Italian authorities. It mentioned three service provider ships had reached the vessel, which reported no bother and was heading for Italy. ERT TV mentioned about 60 folks have been believed to be on board.

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