More bodies found in south, likely tied to migrant boat wreck

ANTALYA

Turkish authorities have found three more bodies washed up on southern coasts, with the first official statement noting that the latest discoveries could be the result of a sinking migrant boat.

Police and health authorities initiated an investigation after an individual who noticed the lifeless body of a woman while fishing on Jan. 22 in the southwestern city of Muğla reported the incident.

Preliminary examinations revealed that the body was that of a woman and, akin to the bodies found in Antalya over six days, some limbs were missing.

Considering the dismemberment situation of the body, authorities expressed the same possibility on the sunken boat carrying irregular migrants, aligning with both local media reports and the official statement from the Antalya Governor’s Office.

Two more bodies were also discovered on the shore of a hotel in the Serik district of Antalya, bringing the number of bodies found on the southern beaches to nine over the last six days. Police confirmed the discovery of two unidentified bodies at 500-meter intervals on the beach.

In the initial official announcement on Jan. 21, the Antalya Governor’s Office noted that one of the bodies could potentially belong to an 18-year-old girl who had been missing for approximately two weeks. The statement added that the family provided a DNA sample for testing and are waiting for the results.

The authorities determined that the shoes and bags found with the other bodies were of Syrian origin, strengthening the possibility that these bodies might be related to a recently sunk irregular migrant vessel in the Mediterranean, the office explained.

The statement referenced an incident reported by the Lebanese Embassy in the capital Ankara on Dec. 11, 2023, about a vessel carrying around 90 migrants from the coastal area between Lebanon and Syria, destined for Cyprus.

Hours after departure, the vessel lost contact and subsequently went missing, according to the governor’s office.

“Upon analyzing meteorological records from the past week, it was determined that the prevailing wind was coming from the south and the waves were coming from a southeast direction. And there is a possibility that as a result of the possible sinking of the boat, the lifeless bodies in question may drift to the coastal lines of Antalya due to the current, wind and waves,” the governor’s office stated.

The office also emphasized that as of the beginning of 2024, no reports of irregular migration incidents were documented in Antalya.

According to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), more than 3,000 migrants went missing in the Mediterranean in 2023, the highest death toll since 2017.

Türkiye’s southern coasts have been a major route for irregular migrants trying to cross to Europe, especially since the beginning of the Syrian civil war in 2011. Several human rights organizations have described the Mediterranean as the deadliest migration route.