A 2-month-old baby was found dead on Friday after a migrant boat sank off the island of Lesvos, Greece.
The infant was transported to the hospital where the death was declared, specified doctor Theodoros Nousias, medical examiner.
A zodiac carrying migrants, mainly from Africa, overturned when it hit rocks in the Fara area, according to sources at the Lesbos migrant reception center.
During the rescue operations, 30 men, women and children were found safe and sound, according to the latest report from the Coast Guard, which initially spoke of 34 rescued migrants.
Two other people, slightly injured, were also rescued, bringing the number of survivors to 32.
Help prevented from intervening?
The NGO Médecins sans Frontières (MSF) accused the Greek security forces of having prevented its teams from accessing migrants at sea for two hours.
“We will never know if these two hours would have enabled us to save the baby's life,” the NGO stressed.
The latter ensures that 16 people were still on board, including the mother of the baby and that these people were missing.
According to the Greek coastguard, no less than 1,500 people were rescued during the first eight months of 2022, compared to nearly 600 last year.
Since the beginning of the year, around 360 people fleeing wars and poverty in Africa or Asia and heading for Europe have drowned in the eastern Mediterranean, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
Dozens of deaths at the end of the year
Human tragedies are increasing due to the risks taken by migrants who board makeshift boats on stormy or even raging seas in autumn and winter.
On October 11, at least thirty people died in two shipwrecks off the islands of Lesbos and Kythera.
During this last shipwreck which killed at least eight people, dozens of survivors, mainly from Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan, stranded at the foot of a cliff, were hoisted by the rescuers with a winch.
In early November, more than 21 people died and dozens were missing in two simultaneous shipwrecks off the islands of Samos and Euboea.
At the end of November, some 500 migrants were rescued at sea off Crete, prompting Athens to launch an appeal for European “solidarity” for their care.
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