Greece boat disaster: Capsized boat had 100 children in hold – reports

Survivors from a fishing boat that sank off southern Greece in one of Europe’s worst migrant disasters say up to 100 children may have been on board.

At least 78 people have already been confirmed dead in the disaster. But scores more could still be missing at sea, with reports suggesting that up to 750 people were aboard the vessel.

The country’s coastguard has been criticised for not intervening earlier but authorities say their offers of aid were refused. Rescuers are still scouring the seas off Greece in a massive search operation, as hopes of finding more survivors dwindle. Shocking accounts of a large number of women and children travelling in the hold of the ship have come via medics who treated the mostly male survivors.

Manolis Makaris, a doctor at Kalamata hospital, told local reporters that after lending his phone to a survivor to enable them to call home the man had spoken of a large number of children in the hold – possibly as many as 100.

Another reporter from Greece’s ANT1 channel asked a survivor if there were 100 children on board, to which the survivor replied: “Yes”. The charity Save the Children, citing testimonies from survivors, also gave the same number. The BBC has not been able to independently verify this figure.

But government spokesman Ilias Siakantaris said there were unconfirmed reports that up to 750 people in total were on the boat. “We do not know what was in the hold but we know that several smugglers lock people up to maintain control,” he told the broadcaster ERT.

Activist Nawal Soufi was the first to raise the alarm after being contacted by people on the boat on Tuesday morning. She also believes around 750 people were on board.

The boat went down about 80km (50 miles) south-west of Pylos after 02:04 on Wednesday morning local time, according to the Greek coastguard.

(BBC)