Christmas smuggling - Human traffickers exploit holiday season

MANDOUDI, Greece -- Nearly 100 illegal immigrants sat shivering in blankets and ill-fitting clothes Saturday, survivors of a deadly attempt to smuggle them into the country by sea, as authorities feared more tragedies over the Christmas holidays.

Smugglers of immigrants step up their atttempts during major holidays, when law enforcement agencies are understaffed, officials say.

The latest survivors, under guard Saturday in a warehouse, were rescued after a dinghy and a leaky fishing boat carrying Afghans, Iraqis, Kashmiris, Palestinians and others were thrown into the sea Thursday by a storm near the Aegean island of Evia.

At least four people died, and the coast guard was still searching Saturday for up to 20 people others feared drowned, in a rescue effort frequently interrupted by bad gale force winds, rain and snow.

Illegal immigration has become a major concern for European Union-member Greece and human trafficking and frequent deaths from drowning have come to represent the dark side of the holidays.

Bad weather and holidays

"They come on days when the weather is bad, and during holidays," said Prodromos Enotiadis, mayor of Mandoudi, where most of the 98 survivors of Thursday's accident were being held in a warehouse under armed guard.

Evia, lined with remote beaches and linked by bridge to the Greek mainland, is a common target for traffickers.

"This is the third, no the fourth, time we have had this problem. Last year, we had a cargo ship carrying 280 people," Enotiadis said.

Residents of this economically depressed town offered clothes and food for the immigrants.

They are led to the toilet in groups of three. Coast guards wearing surgical masks and gloves hand out food and conduct frequent head counts.

"I'm from Kashmir," said one smiling man who looked happy to be alive. "Thank God" he said, opening his hands in the Muslim sign of prayer.

"What day is it?" asked another. "Is it the 25th?"

A few yards away, their possessions were strewn across the beach. Pants, belts, rolls of toilet paper and packets of unworn socks littered the area around the dinghy where they spent five days.

Coast guard officials said the immigrants each paid $2,000 for the perilous 155-mile journey from Turkey.

Greece, fearing war in Iraq could send more refugees westward, says illegal immigration will be a main priority when it takes over the EU's six-month presidency on Jan. 1.

Athens is pressing the 15-nation bloc for plans to create a European border police by 2004 that also will include sea patrols.

In the wake of the latest deadly accident, Premier Costas Simitis renewed a call for EU assistance to help Greece deal with the problem.

"This has all been orchestrated by traffickers ... These boats were sunk deliberately so that the immigrants could not be turned back," Simitis said Friday.

"In Greece, there are a million foreigners in a country with a population of 10 million. There are schools with more immigrant children than Greeks," he said. "This problem is very acute."