At least 11 migrants dead in sinking off Greece

Six Afghan children drowned after a rubber dinghy headed to Greece sank off Turkey’s Aegean coast Tuesday, the state-run news agency reported.

Meanwhile, there is another migrant tragedy at sea, with the Greek coastguard recovering the bodies of 11 people, including five children.

The wooden boat was believed to have been carrying about 50 people when it began taking on water near the Greek islet of Farmakonissi early Wednesday.

There has been a steep rise in the number of Afghan asylum seekers heading towards Europe during the recent months with estimates by United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) showing at least 146,000 Afghans have left the country during the current year.

The Associated Press (AP) reported that the Hellenic Coast Guard announced that 26 people have been rescued.

The last images of the migrants were from last Sunday, showing the rising tension as hundreds of people demanded to cross the border. That pushed the total for 2015 well above the 800,000 that Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere forecast for the full year in mid-August, a few weeks before the flow of people arriving via Turkey, Greece and the Balkans accelerated.

A record half a million refugees from a four-year civil war in Syria have traveled through Turkey, then risked their lives in rickety boats to reach nearby Greek islands this year, their first stop in the European Union before continuing to wealthier countries in the north and west of the EU.

The Greece-Macedonia border at Idomeni railway station, just across from Gevgelija on the Greek side, was closed on November 18 by the Macedonian authorities, with only those arriving from conflict zones – Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan – allow to pass.

Police said the migrants will be moved to Athens in buses. The victims’ nationalities were not immediately known. Greece is the main point of entry into Europe for the refugees, and the influx has become tough to handle for the country, which is already going through its worst financial crisis in decades.