A total 124 migrants who crossed the Mediterranean Sea from north Africa in three small boats were rescued off the southern coast of Crete Tuesday, authorities said.
The comparatively long passage from eastern Libya to the southern Greek island has become the most common gateway to Greece for people from the Middle East, the Indian subcontinent and Africa, who are seeking a better life deeper in Europe’s prosperous heartland.
So far this year, about 12,000 people have successfully made the crossing, while total arrivals in Greece – including people taking small boats provided by smugglers from the Turkish coast, or crossing the land border with Turkey – have exceeded 22,000.
The Coast Guard said that the three boats located Tuesday were in the sea south of the southern port of Kali Limenes, and their passengers included four women and six children. All were reported in good health.
Last year, a total of nearly 49,000 undocumented migrants entered Greece. The numbers recorded in recent years are dramatically lower than at the peak of Europe’s immigration crisis in 2015, when nearly a million people entered the continent, mostly through Greece’s eastern Aegean Sea islands.
