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Three-year-old Alan Kurdi and his fiver-year-old brother Galib AP
AP
A TURKISH COURT has sentenced two Syrian smugglers to four years and two months each in prison over the death of three-year-old Syrian boy Alan Kurdi and four other people, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported.
The court in the Aegean resort of Bodrum convicted the two of human trafficking but acquitted them of the charge of causing the deaths through deliberate negligence, the agency said.
The image of the boy’s lifeless body lying face down on a Turkish beach galvanised world attention on the refugee crisis, graphically illustrating the magnitude of the migrants’ suffering.
Alan’s brother, Galib, and mother, Rihan, were also among the five victims who drowned when their boat went down in the ill-fated journey from Bodrum to the Greek island of Kos last year. While Turkish authorities have given the boy’s first name as Aylan, his aunt says the family prefers that it be transliterated as Alan.
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Cracking down
Trials in Turkey usually take months – even years – to conclude, but the verdict, which came just a month after the trial opened, appeared to be an effort by the country to show that it is cracking down on human traffickers, just days before a 7 March summit between Turkey and the European Union to discuss the migrant crisis.
Turkey is under pressure to reduce the tide of migrants to Europe and to combat the smuggling rings since it reached a deal with the EU in November. Under the deal, Turkey is scheduled to receive a €3 billion fund to help the country deal with Syrian refugees.
The defendants, Syrian nationals Muwafaka Alabash and Asem Alfrhad, had denied any responsibility in the migrants’ deaths. Instead, they blamed Alan’s father, Abdullah Kurdi, for the tragedy – accusing him of organising the trip. Prosecutors had sought the maximum 35 years in prison for each.
Abdullah Kurdi has since returned to Syria.
Turkish officials say authorities in 2015 detained more than 4,400 smugglers who organise the often-dangerous crossings in frail boats.
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Ah now, Frank, you’ll have to learn that while you’re half right, so is Sinéad. There are some Heads of State (e.g. France and Lithuania) who attend these EU events instead of Heads of Government, depending on the particular country’s laws.
So they should be referred to as “heads of state or government”. The Queen of England has never been at an EU summit. Our Head of State is Michael D Higgins and he hasn’t been to one either. My point is about accuracy
While their gesture is to be commended their economic policicies in other regions and countries are killing and starving other citizens of the world hypocrisy at it.s best
There not spending with in their means their spending everybody elses means to keep them in over inflated wage packets and if nobody is starving why are there soup kitchens popping up all over the place st vincent de paul.innundated with request cappuchin centre over ran with people looking hand outs and as for your hyperbole stick it where the sun dont shine as for bar room rhetoric very seldom frequent them so stick your assumption also where the sun dont shine
How touching. Meanwhile they wage war on their own citizens. Hitting the blind and handicapped through austerity in their own backyard. You would think it was their own money being put to a good use. Oh no they’re far to clever for that they’ve always someone else’s money for good causes.
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