Coast guard searching for distressed boat off southern Peloponnese

Coast guard patrol boats in the southern Peloponnese were on Tuesday morning searching for a sailboat that issued a distress signal several hours earlier, as adverse weather conditions prevented the immediate launch of a rescue operation.

Authorities believe the vessel to be carrying an unknown number of migrants and were unable to give any additional details.

The distress signal issued on the 112 European hotline came after a separate incident involving around 45 migrants and refugees who were rescued from the northeastern coast of the island of Antikythera.

The boat they had used to travel to the southern Greek island has not been recovered and may have been sunk after the migrants reached the shore safely.

The passengers are being transferred to the southeastern Peloponnesian town of Neapoli to undergo processing, so that authorities can determine their nationality and where they were traveling from.