A boat carrying 13 refugees in Balıkesir's Ayvalık district in Turkey's northwestern region has sunk, killing 5 people. Seven people have been rescued.
The Coast Guard has travelled to the scene of the wreckage.
According to the survivors, there were a total of 13 passengers.
“Four children and a woman died and eight others were rescued. There is three-year-old child among the rescued,” said Namik Kemal Nazli, the governor of the Ayvalik district
.
Over the past years, thousands have made short but perilous journeys across the Aegean in a bid to reach northern and Western Europe in search for a better life.
Of the 4,715 migrants and refugees who lost their lives trying to cross the Mediterranean, 429 migrants died in the Eastern Mediterranean route between Turkey and Greece, according to the latest report.
More than a million refugees and migrants traveled from Turkey to Greece last year before a EU-Turkey deal stemmed the flow in March.
The March 18 agreement allows for the return of “irregular migrants” to Turkey from Greece in exchange for Syrian refugees to be relocated within the EU.
