Hundreds feared dead as search continues for missing migrants after fishing boat sinks off Greece
A massive search operation is continuing for “hundreds” of missing migrants after at least 78 drowned when a fishing boat sank off the coast of Greece.
Officials said 104 survivors were rescued after the vessel capsized about 50 miles from the southern coastal town of Pylos.
But charity Alarm Phone, which operates a network supporting rescue operations and received frantic calls from some of those on board, said up to 750 people may have been on the vessel.
Greek officials said the boat got into difficulties when its engine stopped and it began veering from side to side.
It then capsized and sank at around 2am on Wednesday.
Shortly beforehand, Alarm Phone said it spoke to someone on board who said: “The captain left on a small boat. Please, any solution.”
They also pleaded for food and water, and said the vessel had stopped moving, according to the charity.
A survivor being cared for by medical staff after being brought ashore in Kalamata, Greece
The search for survivors continued on Thursday morning and is expected to last until at least Friday, Greek authorities said.
Six coastguard vessels, a navy frigate, a military transport plane, an air force helicopter, several private vessels and a drone from the European Union border protection agency, Frontex, are taking part in the operation.
Officials said it was unlikely the sunken boat would be recovered because the area of international waters is one of the deepest in the Mediterranean.
Three days of national mourning have been declared by the Greek government.
But Alarm Phone accused the Greek and other European authorities of failing to launch a rescue operation before the boat went down, despite being “well aware of this overcrowded and unseaworthy vessel”.
The Greek coastguard denied the claim and said those on board “refused our assistance because they wanted to go to Italy”.
Spokesperson Nikos Alexiou added that they still stayed nearby “in case it needed our assistance which they had refused”.
Survivors were brought to the port city of Kalamata by the coastguard early on Thursday. Many are being treated for conditions including hypothermia and dehydration.
Aerial pictures released by the Greek coastguard showed the 20 to 30-metre-long boat hours before it sank.
Dozens of people on the upper and lower decks were seen looking up, some with arms outstretched.
Witnesses said many more women and children were below in the hold, according to local reports.
Greek authorities, who initially said 79 people had died before later revising the figure down to 78, said they could not confirm how many people were on board.
The UN’s International Organisation for Migration said initial reports suggested there were up to 400 people on the vessel.
The boat is thought to have set off from the Libyan port of Tobruk and was heading to Italy.
Greek authorities said most of the migrants were from Egypt, Syria and Pakistan.
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It comes as Libyan authorities launch a major crackdown on migrants, with several thousand – including Egyptians, Syrians, Sudanese and Pakistanis – detained.
Many Egyptians have been deported to their home country through a land crossing point.
The region is one of the main routes into Europe for refugees from the Middle East, Asia and Africa.
The UN said there have been more than 20,000 deaths and disappearances in the Mediterranean since 2014, making it the most dangerous migrant crossing in the world.
The brutality of Russia’s drone assaults on Ukraine’s towns and cities shows no let up.
“Savage strikes, a deliberate targeted terror” is how the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy described the latest overnight bombardment.
Some 595 attack drones and 48 missiles were involved and even if only a small fraction made it through Ukrainian air defences, the destruction – in Sumy and Odessa, Zaporizhia and Kyiv – is significant.
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Russia strikes Kyiv in major attack
Also overnight, Denmark reported yet more drone sightings.
It has not named Russia directly but after a week in which unidentified drones have resulted in the temporary shutdown of military and civilian airports, it is banning all civil drone flights and describing the threat as a hybrid attack.
Germany is also raising the alarm over unexplained drone activity along its border with Denmark.
Germany’s interior minister said on Saturday: “We are witnessing an arms race, an arms race between drone threats and drone defences. It is a race we cannot afford to lose.”
NATO is having to deploy extra assets to beef up its Baltic Sea defences and its Eastern flank.
European nations are working to establish a drone wall along their borders with Russia and Ukraine.
Germany is setting up a drone defence centre to make sure it has what it needs to protect itself.
The Kremlin is forcing NATO to divert assets to protect its airspace and sub-sea infrastructure at a time when Europe is trying to work out how best to support and finance Ukraine.
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With drones an inexpensive element of its hybrid warfare arsenal, Russia is sending a clear warning that it can relatively easily chip away at Europe’s defences and that Europe had better focus on protecting itself.
“If NATO begins to look too rattled, that actually is encouragement for Putin precisely to step up the pressure,” says Mark Galeotti, a specialist in Russian security. “So really we need to be holding our nerve.
“Yes, reserving the right to shoot things down that look like direct threats, but otherwise actually talking down, not talking up, the nature of the threat while of course we arm so that we are even more prepared.”
Last week, Estonia said its fighter jets had escorted three Russian MIG fighter jets out of their airspace after a 12-minute incursion, which Russia denies ever took place.
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Russia denies violating Estonia airspace amid NATO outrage
On Saturday, Estonia pledged €10m (£8.7m) to NATO’s “Prioritised Ukraine Requirement List” or PURL programme, which sees US-produced weapons, paid for by NATO’s European partners, fast-tracked to Ukraine.
Zelenskyy posted on Sunday after speaking with the NATO secretary general that PURL is moving forward well. And that is just what Russia is trying to prevent.
Hamas’s armed group has claimed it has lost contact with two hostages as a result of Israel’s operations in Gaza – after it called on air deployments to be stopped for 24 hours.
In a statement, Hamas’s armed al-Qassam Brigades said it had demanded that Israel halt air sorties for 24 hours, starting at 6pm, in part of Gaza City, to remove the hostages from danger.
It comes a day before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is due to meet US President Donald Trump and as the number of those killed in Gaza surpasses the 66,000 mark, according to the enclave’s Hamas-run health ministry.
Its figure does not differentiate between civilians and fighters.
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Volunteer nurse’s video diary of Gaza horrors
A total of 48 hostages are still being held captive by Hamas, the militant group which rules Gaza, with about 20 believed by Israel to still be alive. A total of 251 hostages were taken on 7 October 2023, when Hamas launched an unprecedented attack on Israel which killed 1,200 people.
Situation on the ground
In Gaza, a war-torn enclave where famine has been declared in some areas and where Israel has been accused of committing acts of genocide – which it has repeatedly denied – the almost two-year war raged on.
On Sunday, the number of those killed rose to at least 21 as five people were killed in an airstrike in the Al Naser area, local health authorities said, while medics reported 16 more deaths in strikes on houses in central Gaza.
The Civil Emergency Service in Gaza said late on Saturday that Israel had denied 73 requests, sent via international
organisations, to rescue injured Palestinians in Gaza City.
Israeli authorities had no immediate comment. The military earlier said forces were expanding operations in the city and
that five militants firing an anti-tank missile towards Israeli troops had been killed by the Israeli air force.
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‘We will get it done’
In Monday’s White House meeting, President Trump is expected to share a new 21-point proposal for an immediate ceasefire.
His proposal would include the release of all hostages within 48 hours and a gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Palestinian enclave, according to three Arab officials briefed on the plan, the PA news agency reports.
A Hamas official said the group was briefed on the plan but has yet to receive an official offer from Egyptian and Qatari mediators. Hamas has said it is ready to “study any proposals positively and responsibly”.
Mr Trump, who has been one of Israel’s greatest allies, said on Sunday there is “a real chance for greatness in the Middle East”.
It is unclear, however, what Mr Trump was specifically referring to.
He said in a Truth Social post: “We have a real chance for Greatness in the Middle East. All are on board for something special, first time ever. We will get it done.”
On Friday – the same day a video of diplomats walking out on Mr Netanyahu during his address to the United Nations went viral – Mr Trump said he believed the US had reached a deal on easing fighting in Gaza, saying it “will get the hostages back” and “end the war”.
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Diplomats walk out as Israeli PM speaks at UN
“I think we maybe have a deal on Gaza, very close to a deal on Gaza,” the US president told reporters on the White House lawn as he was leaving to attend the Ryder Cup.
Mr Trump has repeatedly claimed an agreement to end the war was imminent, only for nothing to materialise.
Weeks ago, he said: “I think we’re going to have a deal on Gaza very soon.”
It was one sentence among the many words Donald Trump spoke this week that caught my attention.
Midway through a jaw-dropping news conference where he sensationally claimed to have “found an answer on autism”, he said: “Bobby (Kennedy) wants to be very careful with what he says, but I’m not so careful with what I say.”
The US president has gone from pushing the envelope to completely unfiltered.
Last Sunday, moments after Charlie Kirk‘s widow Erika had publicly forgiven her husband’s killer, Mr Trump told the congregation at his memorial service that he “hates his opponents”.
President Donald Trump embraces Charlie Kirk’s widow Erika. Pic: AP
Twenty-four hours later, he drew fierce rebuke from medical experts by linking the use of Tylenol (paracetamol) during pregnancy to increased risk of autism.
The president treats professional disapproval not as a liability but as evidence of authenticity, fuelling the aura that he is a challenger of conventions.
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‘Paracetamol use in pregnancy perfectly safe’
On Tuesday, he went to the United Nations, where his frustrations over a stalled escalator and teleprompter failure were the prelude to the most combative address.
“I’m really good at this stuff. Your countries are going to hell,” he told his audience, deriding Europe’s approach to immigration as a “failed experiment of open borders”.
Mr Trump addresses the UN General Assembly in New York. Pic: Reuters
Then came a U-turn on Ukraine, suggesting the country could win back all the land it has lost to Russia.
Most politicians would be punished for inconsistency, but Mr Trump recasts this as strategic genius – framing himself as dictating the terms.
It is hard to keep track when his expressed hopes for peace in Ukraine and Gaza are peppered with social media posts condemning the return of Jimmy Kimmel to late-night television.
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Trump’s major shift in Ukraine policy
Perhaps most striking of all is his reaction to the indictment of James Comey, the FBI director he fired during his first term.
In theory, this should raise questions about the president’s past conflicts with law enforcement, but he frames it as vindication, proof that his enemies fall while he survives.
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Ex-FBI chief: ‘Costs to standing up to Trump’
Mr Trump has spent much of his political career cultivating an image of a man above the normal consequences of politics, law or diplomacy, but he appears to feel more invincible than ever.
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From funerals to world summits, world peace to public health, he projects the same image: rules are for others.
It is the politics of the untouchable.
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