Baby’s body off Lesvos brings migrant toll to 9
One week after the drowned corpses of eight illegal immigrants were found in the sea off the eastern Aegean island of Lesvos, coastguards have recovered the body of a baby from the same area, officials said yesterday. A Merchant Marine Ministry statement said the baby, whose decomposing body was found off the island’s northern coast on Thursday, had probably been with the group of apparently Afghan migrants whose vessel is believed to have sunk two weeks ago. On October 16 and 18, the still-unidentified bodies of four children and four adults were found off Lesvos. Most had been wearing life vests. Police believe the group had been aboard one of the dozens of Turkish smuggling boats that ply the narrows separating the eastern Aegean islands from the Turkish mainland. On Thursday, Chios coastguards arrested 24 African and Asian illegal immigrants found on an islet near Oenousses.
