Coast Guard releases video showing migrant boat sinking
Greece’s Coast Guard on Tuesday released a video showing the moment a boat carrying 22 migrants sank northeast of the island of Lesvos, where four people died on Monday.
A Coast Guard source said on Monday that the boat was spotted in Turkish territorial waters and the country’s Coast Guard was notified without response.
When migrants saw the Greek Coast Guard vessel they fell into the sea which prompted a search and rescue operation inside Turkish territorial waters, the same source added.
Eighteen people were rescued from the sea and four drowned, Greek authorities said. Government spokesperson Pavlos Marinakis said all four were children: an 8-year-old boy and three girls aged 14, 8 and 11 months.
The Turkish Coast Guard denied on Tuesday that the incident took place within its area of competence. It said that when its vessel arrived at the scene where the incident took place, officers saw that “all the migrants had boarded two plastic boats belonging to a Greek Coast Guard vessel with the number LS-080, there were no migrants in the sea and no search and rescue operations were being carried out by the personnel of the Greek Coast Guard at that time.”
Βίντεο με τη στιγμή που βυθίζεται η λέμβος με τους 22 μετανάστες & οδήγησε στο θάνατο 4 παιδιά στις 6:15 την 28/8/2023, ΒΑ ν. Λέσβου, 2,5 ν.μ. εντός Τουρκικών Χωρικών Υδάτων. pic.twitter.com/4crJqGRdof
— ΛΙΜΕΝΙΚΟ ΣΩΜΑ (@HCoastGuard) August 29, 2023
