42 migrants drown as 2 smuggling boats sink off Greece

Officials blamed the drownings in two separate incidents on overcrowded boats.

At least 21 people including eight children died after their boats sank off the Greek islands of Farmakonisi and Kalolimnos early Friday, with dozens of other migrants reported missing, the coastguard said.

In the first two weeks of 2016, more than 23,000 people arrived by sea in Greece and 50 have died, the IOM said.

There are fears that the death toll could rise as the Greek coastguard estimates up to 100 people were on one of the boats. Hundreds of people from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq stranded at the borderline as neighboring Macedonia has again stopped letting in refugees heading north from Greece.

Merkel met Friday with Turkey’s prime minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, the latest in a series of discussions between the countries about what more Turkey could do to keep the refugees pouring over its border with Syria from traveling on to Western Europe.

Over a million migrants arrived in Europe illegally past year. More than 800,000 entered Greece previous year, mostly using rickety boats to reach Greek islands from the nearby Turkish coast.

Shortly after that, a wooden sailboat sank near another Greek island, Kalolimnos, and coast guard described a “large-scale rescue” operation underway in the area. According to the International Organisation for Migration, deaths in the Mediterranean in the past 24 hours bring to at least 113 the total number of fatalities recorded, which is more than the past two Januaries combined, when 94 deaths were recorded – 12 in January 2014 and 82 a year ago.

“The refugee crisis is not Germany’s crisis, it is not Europe’s crisis, it is not Turkey’s crisis”, Davutoglu said in a news conference with Merkel.

But the European Union has yet to deliver on the deal either, with member states still squabbling over the financing for aid towards the 2.2 million Syrian refugees that Turkey is hosting.

Officials said this was one of the worst incidents in months, adding they did not yet know why the boat had capsized.

Speaking to the BBC at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Valls said the Continent could not accommodate the enormous numbers of migrants and warned that they could destabilize European societies. It was not clear why the vessel capsized, but witnesses said strong winds were blowing at the time.

An increasing number of refugees are trying to reach Europe’s front states of Greece and Italy through the country despite harsh weather.

“The hospital is now full of dead people”, he said. The coast guard rescued 22 men and four women, and recovered 34 bodies – those of 16 women, seven men and 11 children.

In the second tragedy off Farmakonissi, the Coast Guard recovered the bodies of six children and one woman after rescuing 40 survivors.