More than a hundred migrants reached the southern shores of Crete overnight after crossing the Mediterranean Sea in two small boats from north Africa, authorities said Friday.
A Coast Guard statement said 47 men, three women and seven children were found on the beach of Elygia early Friday, near the village of Aghios Ioannis, and were transferred to the northern port of Iraklio.
Late Thursday, 47 men, four women and seven children were picked up off the beach of Tsoutsoura after landing in a small boat. The Coast Guard said an 18-year-old man from Sudan who was among them was arrested on suspicion of having piloted the boat across from the Tobruk area of eastern Libya on behalf of a migrant-smuggling ring.
Some 10,000 people have reached Crete from Libya so far this year, about half the total number of arrivals for the whole of Greece.
