Three died and others are missing as a migrant boat sank near Greece

ARK New… Three people have died and about a dozen others are missing when a boat carrying migrants capsized near the Greek island of Mykonos, officials said.

The accident occurred in the Aegean Sea early Friday morning.

The authorities launched a search operation using two rescue helicopters in addition to the Coast Guard and private vessels, after two men, one Palestinian and the other Syrian, swam towards the rocks near the shore and were spotted by the authorities.

The bodies of two women and an adult man were recovered from the sea several hours later.

Greek coast guard spokesman Nikos Kouklas said that moderate winds prevailed in the search area, adding that the accident occurred at around 6 am off the northeastern coast of Mykonos.

The island is more than one hundred and fifty kilometers away from the nearest point of the Turkish coast.

Recently, smugglers based in Turkey have increasingly relied on open sea routes in recent years to try to avoid the heavily patrolled waters of the eastern Aegean Sea, where several large Greek islands lie close to the Turkish coast.

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