Heartbreaking image: drowned Syrian toddler’s body washes ashore in Turkey after refugee boat sinks

A photograph of a toddler’s lifeless body washed ashore on a Turkish beach after a migrant boat sank has caused shock and outrage around the world, and became a poignant image of the refugee crisis. The images showed three-year-old Aylan Kurdi, wearing a soaked red T-shirt and shorts, lying face down in the sand near Bodrum, one of Turkey’s prime tourist resorts, before he was picked up by a police officer. He was believed to be one of at least 12 Syrian migrants who died trying to reach Greece when their boats sank in Turkish waters. Aylan Kurdi’s five-year-old brother Galip and mother Rehan, 35, also died when the boat capsized. His father, Abdullah, was found semi-conscious and taken to hospital near Bodrum, according to Turkey’s Sabah newspaper. One of their relatives told a Canadian newspaper today that Kurdi’s family had been trying to emigrate to Canada after fleeing the war-torn town of Kobani – Kobani, a town in northern Syria near the Turkish border where there was heavy fighting between Islamic State insurgents and Kurdish regional forces several months ago. A map of the perilous journey The Turkish coastguard said two boats sank after separately setting off separately from the Akyarlar area of the Bodrum peninsula for the Greek Aegean island of Kos early on Wednesday. Among the dead were five children and a woman. Another 15 people were rescued and the coastguard, backed by helicopters, was continuing its search for three more who were still missing, a statement said. “I heard the news at five o’clock this morning,” Teema Kurdi, Abdullah’s sister and a resident of Vancouver, was quoted as saying by Canada’s National Post newspaper. Teema had been contacted by the wife of one of Abdullah’s brothers. Photos emerged on social media of Aylan and a boy, said to be his brother, smiling next to a teddy bear. Aylan Kurdi. How he should be remembered. The vision of humanity washed up on the beach @#AylanKurdi pic.twitter.com/VRqiZk4Zlz — N Ayrshire Foodbank (@NAfoodbanks) September 3, 2015 “She had got a call from Abdullah, and all he said was, ‘My wife and two boys are dead’,” Teema said. Abdullah, his wife and two children had made a privately sponsored refugee application to the Canadian authorities that was rejected in June because of complications with applications from Turkey, the newspaper quoted Teema as saying. “I was trying to sponsor them, and I have my friends and my neighbours who helped me with the bank deposits, but we couldn’t get them out, and that is why they went in the boat,” she said. “I was even paying rent for them in Turkey, but it is horrible the way they treat Syrians there.” Watch: Grieving father tells his story The hashtag “#KiyiyaVuranInsanlik” (“Humanity washed ashore”) made it to Twitter’s top world trending topics after the image of Aylan Kurdi’s body was widely shared. “If these extraordinarily powerful images of a dead Syrian child washed up on a beach don’t change Europe’s attitude to refugees, what will?” said The Independent in an editorial which was headlined: “Somebody’s child.” Repose en paix #AylanKurdi pic.twitter.com/3yweLZ4rGp — ©Feriel S-Carpentras (@FCarpentras) September 3, 2015 The paper immediately launched a petition demanding Britain accept “its fair share of refugees” which gained 10,000 signatures in hours. The image first taken by the Dogan news agency and which spread like wildfire on social media, also appeared on the websites of Spain’s El Pais, El Mundo and El Periodico, which dubbed the image: “The drowning of Europe”. Turkey has won international praise for taking in two million refugees since the Syrian civil war began in March 2011, spending US$6 billion caring for them and receiving just US$400 million in outside aid. READ MORE: Europe faces worst migration crisis since the second world war But it has warned it is reaching capacity, and thousands are now making the perilous journey by boat from Turkey to Greece in a bid to enter Europe. Abdullah’s family were among at least 12 presumed Syrian refugees who died trying to reach Kos after two boats, carrying a total of 23 people, set off , a naval official said. The UN refugee agency estimates that almost 160,000 refugees and migrants have arrived in Greece by sea since the start of last year. In July more than 50,000 people, mostly Syrians, arrived in Greece compared with 43,500 in the whole of last year. The agency has repeated calls for Greece and the European Union to take steps to address the situation. This week, the Turkish government said the coastguard had rescued over 42,000 migrants in the Aegean Sea in the first five months of this year and more than 2,160 in the last week alone.

Heartbreaking image: drowned Syrian toddler’s body washes ashore in Turkey after refugee boat sinks

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Three-year-old boy's family went on perilous sea voyage after being refused permit to Canada, says family member

Three-year-old boy's family went on perilous sea voyage after being refused permit to Canada, says family member