Pakistani illegal immigrants found dead near Istanbul

[Naveed Yaseen]

ISTANBUL (July 31 2008): The Turkish police on Wednesday discovered the bodies of 13 suspected illegal immigrants dumped in a field in Istanbul's outskirts, media reports said. Police suspect the bodies were dumped by human-traffickers after the migrants suffocated while being clandestinely transported in a packed truck, the Hurriyet newspaper reported on its website.

Most of the dead, found in the Kucukcekmece district on Istanbul's European side, were believed to be Pakistanis, it said. A local elder told Anatolia news agency that a truck had dropped off the bodies as well as about 130 illegal immigrants there early in the morning after the suspected traffickers apparently panicked over the deaths.

The security forces sealed off the area, launching an operation to hunt down the immigrants who ran away, and a helicopter was helping in the search, Anatolia said. About 50 migrants were rounded up and 10 of them were taken to hospital with severe exhaustion, Hurriyet quoted Kucukcekmece mayor Aziz Yeniay as saying.

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