Greek coastguard says more than 300 people have been rescued and four bodies recovered so far in major operation
A rescue operation is under way after a migrant boat carrying hundreds of people capsized south of the Greek island of Crete.
The International Organisation for Migration said more than 700 people were believed to have been on board on the boat. The Greek coastguard said it had heard that there were 400 or 500 people on board, but that it could it not confirm the number
More than 300 people have been rescued and four bodies recovered, the coastguard said.
“The number of people in distress could be counted in the hundreds,” a Greek coastguard spokeswoman told Agence France-Presse. “People are in the water, boats crossing the area have thrown lifebuoys and are moving to save the migrants.”
She said a passing ship spotted the sinking vessel about 75 nautical miles south of Crete in the southern Aegean Sea. The coastguard rushed two patrol boats, a plane and a helicopter to the scene while at least four ships in the area joined the rescue. About half of the roughly 82ft boat was underwater.
At least 1,000 people have died or are missing and presumed dead after a string of deadly incidents in the Mediterranean over the past week, according to the International Organisation for Migration.
The IOM said on Tuesday estimated deaths until the end of May rose to 2,443 on all Mediterranean routes after a surge in reported shipwrecks and other incidents in recent days. The number of estimated deaths has risen by 34% over the first five months of 2015. The spate of deaths has caused the IOM to revise its previous assessment.
“For the first three weeks of May 2016, IOM estimated just 13 fatalities in three incidents,” said IOM. “None of them occurred on the eastern Mediterranean route between Turkey and Greece, where through the first four months of the year nearly 400 migrants and refugees drowned. We saw this as a hopeful trend. The events of this past week – with at least 1,000 deaths – have obviously changed our assessment. The past eight days marks one of the deadliest periods yet in the migration crisis, which is now in its fourth year.”