The Prime Minister, Shehbaz Sharif, has announced national mourning for today after first approximations indicated that close to 300 Pakistanis may have died in the Mediterranean Sea. A password reported that his son had also boarded the crowded fishing boat. Relatives of the victims reported having paid about 8,000 euros for the trip and then losing contact.
Islamabad () – The Pakistani authorities have arrested ten suspected human smugglers because of the recent shipwreck off the coast of the Peloponnese, in which at least 78 migrants died and hundreds are missing. According to the testimonies of the survivors, between 700 and 750 people were traveling in the fishing boat that sank, of which some 300 or 400 came from Pakistan. The victims also included Egyptian, Syrian, Palestinian and Afghan citizens. The Pakistani media they estimate that up to 298 compatriots could have died in the shipwreck.
Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif declared national mourning today and announced the creation of a commission to investigate human trafficking, specifying that those responsible will be “severely punished.” The four-member commission was also instructed to submit a report to the government before next week.
Most of the arrests occurred in Kashmir, the region from which the majority of the migrants also came (about 135 people), while others had left from the eastern province of Punjab. The detainees are accused of sending Pakistani youths to Libya, from where the boat would later depart with the aim of reaching Italy. In Greece authorities also detained nine Egyptians accused of driving the crowded fishing boat, and they will appear in court today, despite the fact that non-governmental organizations have denounced various irregularities at trial.
The families of those who died in the shipwreck said that they had paid 2.3 or 2.5 million rupees (almost 8,000 euros) to book a trip to Italy for their children. Muhammad Mukhtar Butt, the father of 27-year-old Kashif, told the Pakistani daily dawn that he had received a call from password that he had organized his son’s trip a few days before the shipwreck: the man wanted to congratulate him because Kashif was going to Europe. But after a few days “the password disappeared and his phone is turned off too,” the father explained.
Relatives of six other migrants from a town near Wazirabad told the same story. Although they had not had contact with their children for at least 10 days, some had been told that their loved ones were not on the ship that sank. Uncertainty is increased by difficulties in the identification process. Raja Sakundar, from Kotli district in Kashmir province, said all of his grandchildren, between the ages of 18 and 36, are missing.
Usman, one of the survivors, nevertheless managed to contact his family from a refugee camp in Greece. The parents explained that the boat had run out of drinking water and had been adrift for five days. According to a reconstruction of Guardian, at least six people aboard the boat had already died due to lack of water and overcrowding. Once on the ship, the Pakistani migrants were “relegated to the most dangerous part of the boat” while the women and children were locked in the hold.
The men detained so far in Pakistan gave the names of the human traffickers they work for (Chaudhry Zulqernain, Talat Kiani, Khalid Mirza and Sajid Mehmood, almost all of whom are residents of Libya) and explained that the journey to Europe begins with a flight ( legal) to United Arab Emirates, Egypt or Libya. One of the detainees also recounted that his son was also on the fishing boat that sank. The smugglers later admitted that other Pakistanis who had attempted the crossing earlier are currently incarcerated in Libya.
Thousands of young Pakistanis with no chance of obtaining a legal visa for Europe also face risky journeys through Iran or Turkey. Pakistan has been mired in a political and economic crisis for more than a year, with inflation reaching 38% in May and stalled negotiations to obtain a loan from the International Monetary Fund to avoid financial default.
