22 killed in refugee truck crash in Turkey
At least 22 people, including children, have been killed in incident during which a truck carrying refugees crashed in western Turkey.
The deadly incident took place in Turkey’s western province of Izmir on Sunday, after the truck veered off the road and overturned, according to Turkey’s state-run Anadolu news agency.
The crash left 13 other people injured.
Video and photos published by Anadolu showed the mangled wreckage of the open top truck laying in a canal, some 20 meters below a highway from which it apparently fell after crashing through a barrier.
Ambulances and paramedics were dispatched to the scene to treat the injured. Emergency workers worked to retrieve the dead and wounded trapped in the wreckage.
The truck was en route to Izmir from Aydin Province and overturned in the Menderes district, according to anonymous local sources.
Turkey’s DHA news agency said the truck’s passengers were foreign refugees who had reached a deal with traffickers to be transported by boat to the Greek island of Samos, off the coast south of Izmir.
There were no further details on the identity of the victims and their nationalities.
The chief public prosecutor’s office in Menderes has reportedly launched an investigation into the incident.
The deadly crash took place just days after at least eight asylum seekers, trying to cross into Greece, were killed when their boat sank off the coast of Izmir.
Turkey has been one of the main routes for asylum seekers and refugees fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and Africa, but numbers have fallen since a peak in 2015.
More than a million people have crossed to European Union (EU) member Greece from Turkey since 2015.
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