Austrian police find 24 Afghan refugees in truck
Austrian police have found two dozen Afghan refugees sealed into the back of a small truck, believed to have come from Hungary.
Confined in an air-tight compartment, the 24 asylum seekers faced extreme danger of suffocation, police in the Austrian capital, Vienna, said late on Tuesday, adding that the tailgate of the truck had been locked and the sliding side door had been welded shut.
The Romanian driver tried to flee as police officers approached the truck, but was caught.
The young Afghans were still in good health, seemingly because they had not traveled a long distance, but might not have been able to extricate themselves if police had not intervened, officials said.
The incident comes less than a week after the discovery of the decomposing bodies of 71 people, possibly a group of Syrian refugees, inside an abandoned truck near the Austrian border with Hungary.
Europe is facing an unprecedented influx of refugees, mainly coming from conflict-stricken countries like Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. Most of the refugees land in Italy or Greece, and then head for the wealthier countries of northern Europe by transiting through countries in Eastern Europe and the Balkans, like Macedonia, Serbia and Hungary.
Semi-official estimates say more than 2,300 refugees have died crossing the Mediterranean this year, up nearly by 300 from a year ago.
The 28-member European Union is divided on what to do with the huge refugee crisis, with Western European leaders calling for more efforts to help with the new arrivals as countries on the eastern borders say they are struggling to handle the turmoil.
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