Greek coast guards, which continued their search Monday to find those missing from the tragic June 14 shipwreck off Greece, recovered three bodies “in an advanced state of decomposition.” However, they could not confirm that they were migrants who died in the sinking. As the days go by, the versions of the survivors of the incident are known, which contradict that released by the Government.
Three bodies have been recovered during the search for survivors of the tragic sinking of a migrant boat off the coast of Greece, which left at least 78 dead – 81 if confirmed to be passengers on the boat.
The three bodies “were in an advanced state of decomposition” and it was impossible to determine their sex, the Greek coast guard said on Monday June 19.
They were rescued west of the Peloponnese peninsula, in the area where an old boat carrying hundreds of migrants sank on Wednesday morning, the coast guard spokeswoman told AFP.
However, when questioned, the Coast Guard could not confirm that the three bodies recovered were those of immigrants who perished in the sinking.
Only 104 people have been rescued so far, including 47 Syrians, 43 Egyptians, 12 Pakistanis and two Palestinians, according to a June 14 tally by Greek authorities.
Numerous relatives of the migrants who were on board the damaged boat have traveled to Greece in recent days in search of news about the victims.
On board were more than 140 Syrians and many of them are missing, relatives told AFP.
found versions
The new accounts raised further questions about the Greek coast guard’s response from the moment it located the ship until it sank. Authorities in Athens have insisted that the metal fishing boat carrying migrants from Libya to Italy was not towed at any time, and had only a line attached briefly hours before it capsized and sank.
The coast guard has also been widely criticized for not trying to rescue the migrants before their boat sank. However, it has argued that the boat refused any help and insisted on heading to Italy. Furthermore, he ruled that it would have been too dangerous to attempt to evacuate hundreds of unwilling people from a crowded ship. Full details of the incident remain unclear.
Ali Sheikhi, a Kurdish man from the war-torn northeast Syrian city of Kobani, hoped the ship would lead him to a better life in Europe. Then he would eventually bring his wife and his three young children.
The migrant assures, as well as many of the survivors, that there were up to 750 people on board. Sheikhi assured ‘Kurdish TV Rudaw’ that he and other Kobani relatives, including a younger brother who died, had agreed to pay the smugglers $4,000 each for the trip, a sum later increased to $4,500.
“We said ‘no problem,’ as long as the boat is big and in good condition,” he told Rudaw on Sunday night, speaking by phone from a closed reception center near Athens, where he has moved to the survivors. “They told us that we shouldn’t bring food or anything else because everything is available on the ship.”
The smugglers did not allow anyone to bring life jackets and threw all the food the passengers had into the sea, he added, echoing the accounts of other survivors collected by the AP. Sheikhi recounted that he and his companions were led into the ship’s hold, a death trap where hundreds, including women and children, are believed to have drowned, but climbed on deck after paying the smugglers extra money.
When the ship sank, it had been five days at sea. The water ran out after a day and a half, and some passengers resorted to drinking seawater, according to the man’s account. Sheikhi added that the boat sank after her engine broke down and another boat tried to tow it away.
“In the pull, (the boat) sank,” he said. “We don’t know who it belonged to.” Other survivors have made similar claims in accounts posted on social media, and other survivors were quoted anonymously in Syrian media on Monday as saying the ship was being towed.
“One side went up and people fell into the sea,” Sheikhi told Rudaw. “People started screaming” in the dark. “Each person tried to hold on to the other and push them down to keep them out of the water. So I thought no one would survive,” she noted.
Greek authorities have insisted that the ship rocked violently before sinking after a sudden change of position by many of its passengers.
A right-wing candidate expelled for racist comments
A right-wing candidate for the upcoming legislative elections was expelled from his party, New Democracy (ND of outgoing Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis) on Friday night for his statements described as racist after this shipwreck off Pylos, in the south of the country.
While deploring the “tragic” loss of migrants in the waters of the Mediterranean, including “children”, Spilios Kriketos, the candidate for deputy under the label ND said Thursday that Greece “cannot tolerate more migrants”, accusing most of them of stealing, in an interview on the YouTube channel ‘Kontra’.
These comments caused rejection. The main left-wing opposition party, Syriza, called them a “racist recital” and called on the ND to exclude Kriketos.
The media and NGOs have repeatedly accused Greece of carrying out “illegal” returns of immigrants in the Aegean Sea, however the criticism is rejected by the government.
For the past four years, outgoing Prime Minister and New Democracy (ND) leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis has led security crackdowns, punctuated by border blockades, to fight what he sees as an “invasion” of immigrants from the neighboring Turkey, and a reinforcement of the police force.
With AFP and AP
This article was adapted from its original in French.
