Kin worry worst with 4 males and a boy lacking after Mediterranean ship catastrophe

BEIRUT — Seeking to seek out lives higher than they’d of their war-scarred city in northeast Syria, 4 males and a 14-year-old boy from the Sheikhi household set out for Europe.

Ignoring an older relative’s warnings, the group boarded a fishing boat from Libya to Italy, the place they hoped to begin crossing Europe on land and get to Germany.

Instead of docking in Italy, the trawler capsized and sank Wednesday in hundreds of toes of seawater 75 kilometers (45 miles) off Greece, near the deepest a part of the Mediterranean. The trawler could have carried as many as 750 passengers. Hundreds remained lacking late Thursday. It can be one of many worst Mediterrranean shipwrecks in current historical past if officers affirm family members’ worst fears, as anticipated.

Five members of 1 household had been aboard the trawler, together with Ali Sheikhi, 29. The father of three boys, he left behind his spouse, and boys – ages 6, 5 and a couple of – hoping to sooner or later reunite in Europe and provide the youngsters the nice schooling now not discovered at dwelling.

“He wanted to save his children,” mentioned Abdo Sheikhi, 38, Ali’s brother.

Abdo Sheikhi reached Germany seven years in the past. His 5 family members left Kobani, a border city close to Turkey, in early March.

Once a logo of victory towards Islamic State militants in 2015, Kobani has been hit by the nation’s bitter divisions, and over a decade of conflict, like a lot of Syria. With no growth, no funding and no signal of peace, many in northeastern Syria are following the footsteps of earlier migrants to Europe however taking a lot greater dangers as a result of Turkey has been tightening its borders and making the land crossing more durable.

Many of the Syrians lacking had been additionally from Daraa, a area in Syria’s southernmost tip, close to the border with Jordan.

Abdo Sheikhi’s 5 family members went by means of government-controlled Syria into Lebanon. They then flew to Cairo and from there to Tripoli and on land to Tobruk, Libya. Aside from the bills paid to achieve Libya, the 5 had been imagined to pay $6,000 every to the smugglers, cash that was to be paid as soon as they reached Italy.

“They were supposed to arrive in three or four days,” Mohamed Abdi Marwan, an uncle, mentioned talking by cellphone from Kobani, a Kurdish-majority city. “It was a shock. We had hoped they will get there safely.”

Nine survivors had been arrested Thursday on suspicion of being members of the ring that organized the voyage, the Greek coast guard mentioned. State-run ERT TV mentioned the suspects had been all Egyptian nationals.

“In Syria, there are no means for a life,” Abdo Sheikhi mentioned. “Once they decided, I told them the Libya road is very dangerous and very long. They said: others made it. We too will take that road.”

Shahin, one other relative of Sheikhi’s, who can also be a resident of Germany, mentioned he final heard from his relative when he complained in regards to the circumstances in ready in Libya for months. The smugglers wouldn’t allow them to go away the rooms the place they had been, ostensibly to keep away from detection, usually confiscated their telephones, and wouldn’t deliver them the meals they requested.

“They were seven to a room … They didn’t see the sun,” mentioned Shahin, who spoke on situation of anonymity with the intention to not jeopardize his capacity to remain in Germany. “They were sad and gripped by despair. But they would not take a decision to go back to Syria.”

The males from the Sheikhi household texted family members late final Thursday to say they would go away in just a few hours, on a ship that was supposed to hold 300 folks, mentioned the elder Sheikhi.

The household waited for a affirmation picture from Italy. None got here.

“The (smugglers) sent the boys to their deaths,” Abdo Sheikhi mentioned.

Hours after rescue operations started, a member of the Sheikhi household thought he noticed Ali in a photograph of survivors posted on social media. The man was laying on the ground in a line of others wrapped in blankets within the makeshift camp arrange for the passengers. His hand was raised, overlaying most of his face, apart from a particular beard. Then got here one other image of a person uncovered and sitting up, holding a bit of paper.

There was no signal of different family members and no method to attain the person on the ground to substantiate it’s Ali.

The elder Sheikhi, working as an electrician in Germany, mentioned he has known as the hospital in Greece to attempt to get info, with no luck. He was unable to get information from the makeshift camp and remains to be weighing whether or not to journey to Greece to search for family members.

Abdo Sheikhi mentioned the journey to Greece will price him not less than 600 euros and he can’t communicate English.