20000105

220 illegal Asian

immigrants found

on Greek beach

ATHENS: Two hundred and twenty illegal Asian immigrants, mostly Iraqi Kurds and Afghans, have been found on a beach on the island of Naxos, the Greek merchant Marine Ministry said late on Monday.

Among the exhausted, hungry immigrants was a young woman, probably an Iraqi Kurd, in her ninth month of pregnancy, police said. She was taken to a dispensary on the island, in the Aegean Cyclades archipelago.

Port authorities and police took the immigrants to the primary school where they were given food and medical treatment.

Police were trying to work out how they could have reached Naxos at a time when force nine winds were lashing the Aegean. The ministry said a fast patrol boat, the Bural Avci of unknown nationality, had been found empty nearby.ÑAFP