Three out of six members of a family from Kirkuk died after that a boat carrying at least 100 migrants from Turkey hit rocks and sank in the Aegean Sea on December 23rd.
The boat was heading to Italy. It has departed Turkey two days earlier yet following the hitting of rocks off Greek Islands.
A month ago, Karwan Gahfoor, 37 and his wife Ashti Jubrail, 34, have decided to head to Turkey to join thousands of migrants fleeing conflict and seeking a better life in Europe.
Azima Othman, 51, mother of Jubrail, has decided to join her only kid in the risky journey of being smuggled into Western Europe.
On December 21st, the smugglers tell tens of Iraqi Kurd families in Turkey that boat is ready to smuggle them to Italy, Yasin Othman, brother of Azima and uncle of Ashti, told KirkukNow.
Karwan and Ashti are parents for three daughters: Soz was 11, Raz 8 and Tablo only 4-months-old.
“The main reason behind their decision was to take their middle daughter suffering Down Syndrome to Europe because they were tired of her treatment and lack of school or special shelter,” Yasin bitterly said.
The main reason behind their decision was to take their middle daughter suffering Down Syndrome to Europe because they were tired of her treatment and lack of school or special shelter
Yasin recalls his sister insisted to escort her daughter and her family.
“The last time I talked to them was on Tuesday December 21. They told me the boat was ready and they leave at night via Aegean Sea and I lost contact with them at night.”
On December 23, Karwan phones Yasin and tells him the boat headed toward a mountain and wrecked. Ashti, Raz and Azima drowned.
At least sixteen people died when a migrant boat sank in the Aegean, Greece's coastguard said early Saturday, just hours after a similar incident claimed another 11 lives.
According to Athens News Agency, the coastguard found 16 bodies late Friday, including those of three women and a baby, and rescued 63 people from a boat that overturned and sank near the island of Paros.
Hours earlier, 11 bodies were recovered from a boat that ran aground on an islet north of the Greek island of Antikythera on Thursday evening.
Ninety people stranded on the islet were rescued, the coastguard said.
Last Wednesday, a yacht carrying migrants capsized off the island of Folegandros, killing at least three people.
Thirteen people were rescued, while dozens remain missing, Greek authorities said.
The UN refugee agency UNHCR said the Folegandros accident was the worst in the Aegean Sea this year. The UNHCR estimates that more than 2,500 people have died or gone missing at sea in their attempt to reach Europe from January through November this year.
A video posted by a migration affairs activist, Ranj Pishdary, shows a call from a migrant telling the activist that out of 100 migrants, 10-15 drowned.
Pishdary says in a Facebook post that following a fight between two Syrian migrants and the captain of the boat, the boat hits rocks and stops. The three members of the Kirkuki family died in the boat crash.
Greece coast guard rescue about 90 migrants and recover 10 bodies sent to forensic medicine for identification.
Karwan told Yasin they had safety vests yet he managed to rescue Soz and Tablo while the others were at the back of the boat.
“I have managed to rescue Soz and Tablo only. When I was back for the others, I couldn’t. Coast guard rescued me later,” Karwan told KirkukNow over the phone from one of migrants’ camps in Greece.
I have managed to rescue Soz and Tablo only
Yasin is sorry for the big loss. “I have told them several times that you ae educated people and you are not obliged to take the risk of smuggling via sea but their down daughter made them desperate because they couldn’t make her life better.”
Karwan was a civil servant at Kirkuk agriculture department and his wife Ashti was a teacher of mathematics.
Last week incidents come only a month after that 27 migrants died in an attempt to cross the English Channel from France to Britain. Greece remains a key route for migrants and asylum seekers, though arrivals have dropped sharply in recent years, as have deaths at sea, since the peak of Europe’s refugee crisis in 2015 and 2016.
“They have told us the smugglers promised the boat is in good condition and will leave tonight. We lost everything and hope the government returns their bodies,” one of Ashti aunts said.
“This is death road and we call on people never leave their children take that risk.”
