Cyprus rescues migrants from boat sinking in Mediterranean
The Cyprus coastguard rescued 26 people
overnight, mostly women and children believed
to be Syrian migrants, from a boat sinking in the
Mediterranean, officials said Wednesday.
Passengers said the eight-metre (26-foot)
pleasure craft had set off for Greece
Friday from Tripoli, Lebanon, and ran
out of fuel the following day.
They then drifted until the vessel ran
into heavy seas off the island’s southeast
coast, officials said.
One of the men on board, later arrested
as one of three suspected people
smugglers, telephoned a contact in
Cyprus to alert the authorities that the
boat was in distress, passengers said.
The boat was already going down when
the rescue began, and some of those
saved had to be plucked from the water
by the helicopters and boats involved in
the operation.
The youngest among them was just five
months old, while several were
hospitalised for treatment, including a
young child suffering from hypothermia
and dehydration.
The group consisted of nine men, four
women and 13 children.
The arrests took place after passengers
claimed they had paid $2,000 (1,835
euros) a head for adults and $1,000 for
children for passage.
State radio said two were Syrian and the
third Lebanese.
Police said they had been remanded in
custody for eight days on suspicion of
people trafficking and aiding people to
enter the country illegally.
State radio said most of the migrants are
from government-controlled Tartus on
the Mediterranean, which is one of the
safer areas of Syria.
They had travel documents and were
believed to have been seeking a better
life in Europe.
The rescue took place not far from the
Dhekelia British army garrison, where
114 migrants are being housed after
landing on the beach last month at the
Akrotiri British airbase down the coast.
Both Dhekelia and Akrotiri, from which
Britain carries out strikes against the
Islamic State group in Iraq, are British
sovereign territory and the fate of the
114 remains unclear.
British and Cypriot officials are still in
talks over what should happen to them,
some of whom have claimed asylum on
British soil.
EU member Cyprus lies just 100
kilometres (60 miles) off the Syrian coast
but has so far avoided a mass influx of
refugees from that country’s conflict like
that passing through the Balkans to
Austria, Germany and other countries.
In September, 115 refugees, including 54
women and children, were rescued from
a small fishing boat that ran into trouble
off the south coast.
The UN refugee agency says more than
2,500 people have died trying to cross
the Mediterranean this year, many of
them Syrian refugees.
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