Italy rescues 800 migrants off Sicily coast

At least 800 migrants were rescued off the coast of Sicily on Thursday, among them at least 150 Syrians, the Italian Coast Guard and the UN refugee agency said.

It was by far the largest number of Syrian refugees arriving in Italy in 2016, dwarfing the tiny handful who have so far made it this year on boats from North Africa, suggesting a possible change in tactic as the European Union and Turkey seal off access through Greece and the Balkans.

“This is something new,” said Flavio di Giacomo, spokesperson for the International Organis-ation of Migration, adding that of the 31,000 people who have reached Italy in 2016, only 26 were Syrians. The overwhelming majority were from Africa.

The alarm was raised when a Coast Guard reconnaissance plane spotted two vessels in difficulty off the south-eastern coast of Sicily.

A total of 515 people were rescued from the first boat while around 300 others were taken off the second, the Coast Guard said.

Of the 342 rescued by the Nave Peluso Coast Guard vessel, there were “at least 150 Syrian refugees and more than 40 Iraqis” on board, UN refugee agency spokesperson Carlotta Sami wrote on Twitter. She said they were expected to reach Augusta port at dawn on Friday.

The full number of Syrians and Iraqis on board will only be known when all of the migrants reach port.

With more than a million people entering Europe 2015, countries along the Balkans route began shutting their borders in February, and a month later the EU inked a controversial deal with Ankara under which all migrants arriving on the Greek islands would be sent back to Turkey.