DM Monitoring
Athens: Rescuers scoured seas off Greece on Thursday in a massive search operation, as hopes dwindled of finding survivors of a shipwreck that killed at least 78 migrants in one of Europe’s deadliest such disasters in recent years.
Reports suggested hundreds of people had packed the fishing boat that capsized and sank early on Wednesday in deep waters about 50 miles (80 km) from the southern coastal town of Pylos, while being shadowed by the Greek coast guard.
As dawn broke on Thursday, a coast guard vessel sailed into the nearby port city of Kala-mata, transferring victims. After an official count, authorities revised the death toll to 78 from 79. They said 104 people were rescued.
They said it was unclear how many had been aboard, but were investigating one account from a European rescue-support charity that there could have been 750 people on the 20- to 30 metre-long (65- to 100-foot) boat.
The UN’s International Organization for Migration said initial reports suggested up to 400 people were aboard.
News portals Proto Thema and Skai TV reported that, according to witnesses, mainly women and children were in the vessel’s hold.
Government officials said migrants on the boat, which had set off from the Libyan port of Tobruk, had repeatedly refused offers of help from Greek authorities.
“It was a fishing boat packed with people who refused our assistance because they wanted to go to Italy,” coast guard spokesperson Nikos Alexiou told broadcaster Skai TV.
“We stayed beside it in case it needed our assistance which they had refused.”
