Kurdish woman dies in migrant boat sinking incident in the Aegean Sea

A woman from Erbil drowned after a boat capsized in the Aegean Sea, while the Turkish Coast Guard managed to rescue nine others.

The International Federation of Iraqi Refugees (IFIR) said in a statement that a boat carrying 12 migrants sank in the Aegean Sea on Thursday, killing one person, who is a woman from Erbil.

According to available information, the migrants were from the Kurdistan Region and eastern (Iranian Kurdistan) and western (northeast Syria) Kurdistan.

Iraq and the Kurdistan Region suffer from continuous migration flows. Illegal Kurdish migrants often use Turkey as a transit point to reach prosperous European Union states through Greece. Many rely on smugglers and risk their lives through perilous journeys in overcrowded boats.

Last July, a boat carrying 45 migrants, mostly Syrians, and Kurds, ran out of fuel and sank near the Greek island of Crete.  

Another tragic incident occurred in October 2018 when a total of 34, out of 35, migrants, including 14 Kurds, seven of who were members of the same family from Zakho district of Duhok province, Lost their lives after their boat capsized in the Aegean Sea.



PUKmedia