By Associated Press - Friday, September 20, 2019

BRUSSELS (AP) - The Latest on the influx of migrants into Europe (all times local):

12:30 a.m.

Malta has taken in 35 migrants rescued in the Mediterranean Sea by a humanitarian ship a day earlier.

The Ocean Viking had assisted Maltese authorities and pulled the migrants from an overcrowded wooden boat on Thursday in international waters. The Ocean Viking initially counted 36 people but corrected the number to 35 after the Friday transfer.

Still, 182 migrants remain on the ship, which is operated by SOS Mediterranee and Doctors Without Borders. Malta has refused to take the remaining people, arguing they were found in international waters where Libya has search and rescue duties.

The Ocean Viking declined an offer from Libyan authorities to go to the port of Al-Khums.

-By Renata Brito

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8:00 p.m.

Authorities on the Greek island of Lesbos say they can’t house more newly arrived migrants at a perpetually overcrowded refugee camp that now is 400% overcapacity.

Two officials told The Associated Press the Moria camp has a population of 12,000 and no way to accommodate additional occupants.

The officials say newcomers are sleeping in the open or in tents outside the camp, which was built to hold 3,000 refugees.

Some were taken to a small transit camp run by the United Nations’ refugee agency on the north coast of Lesbos.

The island authorities said at least 410 migrants coming in boats from Turkey reached Lesbos on Friday.

The officials asked not to be identified pending official announcements about the camp.

-By Derek Gatopoulos

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1:50 p.m.

Police in North Macedonia say a 23-year old Pakistani migrant has died after being hit by a train.

The man, identified only by his initials A.I., died late Thursday near the central city of Gradsko.

Migrants who enter North Macedonia illegally from Greece often use rail tracks as a guide for the route toward Serbia, from where they hope to head to more prosperous European countries further north.

In 2015, 14 migrants were killed when they were hit by a train while walking along the railway tracks.

The number of people caught entering North Macedonia illegally from Greece has increased by 20% so far this year, authorities say.

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1:40 p.m.

Police in Slovenia have arrested two Nigerian nationals found near the border with Croatia allegedly driving a van with 31 migrants crammed into it.

Ljubljana police say a patrol stopped the van with Italian license plates late on Thursday near the village of Morava.

The migrants were from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Myanmar, according to a police statement Friday.

Migrants trying to reach Western Europe as they flee war and poverty in their home countries in the Middle East, Africa or Asia, cross into Slovenia from Croatia while seeking to continue toward Austria.

Thousands more remain stuck in other Balkan countries such as Greece, Serbia and Bosnia, looking for a chance to move forward. Many of them are caught several times trying to cross the borders illegally.

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1:25 p.m.

Police in North Macedonia say a 23-year old Pakistani migrant has died after being hit by a train.

The man, identified only by his initials A.I., died late Thursday near the central city of Gradsko.

Migrants who enter North Macedonia illegally from Greece often use rail tracks as a guide for the route toward Serbia, from where they hope to head to more prosperous European countries further north.

In 2015, 14 migrants were killed when they were hit by a train while walking along the railway tracks.

The number of people caught entering North Macedonia illegally from Greece has increased by 20% so far this year, authorities say.

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12:20 p.m.

Turkish coast guards have rescued 14 migrants and their Turkish smuggler after their rubber boat sank off Turkey’s Aegean coast while trying to reach Greece. A search-and-rescue mission is still underway to find a missing infant.

The Turkish Coast Guard said the boat went down Friday off Turkey’s Aegean resort of Yalikavak, on the Bodrum peninsula.

A Coast Guard helicopter and four boats were dispatched to rescue the migrants in response to a distress call.

The migrants’ nationalities were not released.

Hundreds of people continue to head to Greece from Turkey each week, despite a 2016 deal between Turkey and the European Union aiming to curb irregular migration. Most of the migrants hope to make their way to more prosperous European nations further north.

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8:30 a.m.

The International Organization for Migration says a Sudanese man died from a gunshot wound in Libya when a group of migrants resisted being sent to a detention center after they were returned to shore by the Libyan coast guard after a failed attempt to get to Europe.

The IOM says armed men fired into the air when several people in a group of 103 migrants tried to flee from their guards in Tripoli.

IOM staff witnessed Thursday’s incident. They say the man was shot in the stomach. An IOM doctor treated him at the scene but he died two hours later in a local clinic.

Spokesman Leonard Doyle says shooting at “unarmed vulnerable civilians, men, women and children alike, is unacceptable under any circumstances and raises alarms over the safety of migrants and humanitarian staff.”

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