Desperate scenes on Lesbos as at least 15 people drown

A search is continuing in waters off the Greek island of Lesbos, as at least 15 people, including 10 children, drowned in four separate incidents in the Aegean Sea.

At least 15 bodies were recovered in a 24-hour period, while dozens of people were feared to be missing. It is believed that the vessels were carrying refugees trying to reach Greece from Turkey. The EU's border agency Frontex and the Greek coast guard were continuing to search the waters on Thursday night, amid fears that 34 people were unaccounted for.

The drownings were reported just hours after Greek authorities rescued 242 people from a sinking boat in the area. More than 1,000 people were rescued from the seas near Libya on Wednesday, Italian authorities said, including 218 people who were saved from rubber coasts by the Irish ship LE Samuel Beckett.

The vessel took 63 women, including one pregnant woman, six children and 149 men on board during two rescue missions.

Despite the approach of winter and worsening weather conditions, refugees are continuing to make the journey to Europe, the vast majority arriving in Greece. The country has been receiving about 9,000 migrants per day over the last month. While the European Commission last Sunday pledged to help Greece increase capacity at reception centres by 50,000, authorities are struggling to cope with the arrival of refugees on island such as Lesbos, located just 10km from Turkey.

Relocation plan

Meanwhile the European Commission has confirmed that just 86 refugees have been resettled under the EU’s relocation plan agreed last month, which seeks to redistribute 160,000 refugees across the

European Union

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Ireland

, like other countries participating in the scheme, is expected to start receiving refugees under the plan before Christmas, but there has been criticism about the rate of progress of the scheme.

Officials from member states are due to travel to reception centres in Italy and Greece to help select the refugees in the coming weeks.

The EU needs “all member states to tell us how many places they have available right now out of their share of 160,000”, before relocation can take place in larger numbers, a European Commission spokeswoman said.

As the European Union struggles to respond to an unprecedented migration crisis which has seen more than 700,000 refugees enter the European Union this year, tensions have increased between member states, with Germany accusing Austria of driving refugees to the German border under darkness and without warning.

More than 8,000 refugees arrived in the southern German state of Bavaria over the Austrian border on Wednesday alone.

Austria announced this week that it would commence building barriers with neighbouring Slovenia, though Austrian prime minister Werner Fayman said that no razor wire would be used. He also stressed that there would be no fence around the entire country. "We want to be able to enact control, and for that, we need technical security," the Austrian leader said.

Hungary elicited strong criticism from fellow member states for erecting a razor wire fence on its borders with Serbia and Croatia in a bid to stem the flow of migrants transiting through Hungary.