Photo credit: Neos Kosmos
About 150 migrants attempting to reach Greece by sea were rescued by the authorities of that country on Wednesday.
Neos Kosmos reports that one vessel had 115 people packed into it. The boat was located in distress on Tuesday off the coast eastern Aegean Sea Island of Lesbos. Three patriot vessels picked up 67 men, 27 women and 21 children. They were then taken to a migrant reception center on Lesbos.
The boat sank shortly after the passengers had been rescued.
It was one of the largest single boatloads of migrants that had recently reached the island from Turkey.
A Coast Guard report revealed that smugglers typically target Greek islands close to Turkey’s coastline. In recent months, they have chosen longer routes from Libya in Crete and Turkey through the central Aegean Sea, where coast guard patrols are more relaxed.
The coast guard added that on Wednesday, 25 men and seven boys were rescued from a boat having difficulty thirty nautical miles south of Crete. The migrants were quoted as saying they had spent three days crossing the Mediterranean Sea after boarding the vessel in eastern Libya.
Two of the men were arrested on suspicion of belonging to a migrant smuggling group that had organized the voyage.
The coast guard revealed on Tuesday that a total of 146 migrants had been rescued in small boats off Crete and in eastern Aegean.
