New shipwreck in the Aegean – 17 dead immigrants

Seventeen migrants attempting to reach Greece by boat from Turkey have drowned after their boat sank off the Turkish coast.

The victims, all thought to be Syrians, included five women and five children, local media said.

They were trapped in the boat’s cabin as it sank, Turkey’s Dogan news agency reported.

Another 20 people on the boat’s deck, who were wearing life jackets, survived, the news agency said.

Anarchists occupy building to host refugees, solidarity demos in Thessaloniki and Patras

Today, a group of anarchists occupied a building in central Athens to be used as an open refugee shelter. Demos in solidarity with refugees/immigrants will take place in the cities of Thessaloniki and Patras on September 24.

Winter is Coming! Refugees on Samos

Source: https://samoschronicles.wordpress.com/

The summer is coming to an end. The weather here on Samos continues to be sunny and in the midday the temperatures can be in the low 30s. But the evenings and nights are getting cooler. In the past 10 days six refugees that we know of have died whilst trying to get to Samos from Turkey. In a few weeks we can expect this number to rise as the weather and sea cools. We regularly meet with refugees when they land on the beaches. They are nearly always soaked through. The rubber inflatables are so overloaded that they quickly flood. They are not good quality which leads to them being easily punctured by a sharp buckle or belt. The engines, already under powered, often run out of fuel. The result is that the sea journey is nearly always wet, terrifying and arduous when you have to paddle with your arms and hands to keep moving on. This journey is bad enough in the summer but in the winter ……?

13 migrants drown off Turkey coast, 13 missing

Αt least 13 migrants have died off the coast of Turkey Sunday after the inflatable dinghy carrying them to Greece collided with a ferry, Turkish media reports.

Four children are among the victims of the accident involving a boat carrying 46 migrants from the northwestern Turkish port of Canakkale to the Greek island of Lesbos, the Dogan news agency reports.

Twenty people have been rescued but 13 people are still missing, the report adds.

— AFP

Two more shipwrecks near Lesvos islands – many dead and missing

20 people were rescued while 26 are still missing in a new shipwreck that happened this morning off the coasts of Lesvos island.

Yesterday, in another shipwreck always near the island of Lesvos, a 5-year old girl died, 13 people were rescued while 10-12 are still missing.

Clashes in the Serbian/Hungarian border

Another boat capsizes in Aegean Sea, 22 migrants dead

Ankara:  22 migrants drowned and 200 more were rescued when a boat capsized in the Aegean Sea off the Turkish coast while trying to reach the Greek island of Kos today, local media said.

Dogan news agency said the group was travelling to Kos in a 20-metre (66-foot) wooden boat.

34 immigrants dead in the Aegean

On Sunday morning, a boat with more than 100 immigrants capsized in the Aegean, near the island of Pharmakonisi. 34 immigrants lost their lives, among them 15 children. Port police saved 68 immigrants, 29 others managed to swim to the shores.

5 immigrants missing in 2 shipwrecks in the Aegean

Two new shipwrecks were reported yesterday in the Aegean, near the islands of Samos and Lesvos.

In total, 56 sans-papiers were rescued and five are missing, four minors among them.

Migrants claim rogue Greek coastguard are ROBBING them at gunpoint and puncturing their dinghies in the Mediterranean

Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3225321/Pirate-rogue-element-Greek-coastguard-ROBBING-migrants-gunpoint-puncturing-dinghies-Mediterranean.html

• EXCLUSIVE: Migrants claim rogue Greek coastguard are ROBBING them at gunpoint and puncturing their dinghies in the Mediterranean
• Migrants claim that they have have been robbed of their life possessions while on the perilous crossing to Greece by pirates
• They claim that the masked, armed men may be a rogue element of the Greek coastguard and claim their descriptions fit
• The UNHCR, Doctors Without Borders and Save the Children are told MailOnline they are looking into the claims
• Greek coastguard deny the claim, adding pirates are ‘posing as authorities’… but admitted last month that one was a government employee

By Hannah Roberts In Kos For Mailonline

Masked gunmen from the Greek coastguard’s special forces have turned pirate and are robbing refugees in boats in the middle of the Mediterranean, migrants and aid-workers claim.
Migrants have told MailOnline shocking stories of how ‘commandos’ wearing balaclavas and armed with guns have struck in dozens of attacks between Turkey and Greece during July and August.
In some instances, the pirates made off with tens of thousands of euros in cash that the migrants had taken with them to find a better life in Europe – as well as mobile phones.
Victims say the mysterious assailants, who are light-skinned and speak in English and Greek, beat them with sticks and cut off their clothing and underwear to find any hidden phones and money before stealing the boats’ motors.
They then allegedly slice a hole in the rubber boats abandoning them to their fate. At times, the migrants have even been forced into the water.
Migrants, who call the gunmen ‘commandos’ because of their masks, have told MailOnline they believe the attacks are racially motivated and have pointed the finger at a rogue extreme right wing element of the Greek coastguard.
It is a claim supported by some aid organisations.