Authorities said 104 people have been rescued so far following the nighttime incident.
Katerina Tsata, head of a Red Cross volunteer group in Kalamata, said the migrants were also given psychological support.The Greek coast guard said 79 bodies have been recovered so far. It said the survivors included 30 people from Egypt, 10 from Pakistan, 35 from Syria and 2 Palestinians.
Smugglers use unseaworthy boats with as many migrants as possible crammed in — sometimes inside locked holds — for journeys that can take days. They head for Italy, which is directly across the Mediterranean from Libya and Tunisia, and much closer than Greece to the Western European countries that most migrants hope to eventually reach.
The IOM said initial reports suggested up to 400 people were on board. A network of activists said it received a distress call from a boat in the same area whose passengers said it carried 750 people — but it was not clear if that was the vessel that sank. The coast guard boat accompanied the migrant vessel, which the statement said capsized and sank early Wednesday, prompting a massive rescue operation by all the ships in the area.
Over the last two years eastern Libya has seen a resurgence of smuggling operations involving large wooden boats or old fishing vessels that can carry hundreds of migrants, many of them from Egypt and Bangladesh. While these boats are sturdier than inflatable rubber boats or other small craft used in western Libya and Tunisia, overcrowding makes the journey extremely dangerous.
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