Wexford remembers Kurdish asylum seekers
Saturday, 21 May 2005 22:10
A plaque honouring the memory of the eight Kurdish asylum seekers who were found dead in a container en route to Ireland was unveiled this afternoon in Wexford.
The plaque has been erected close to the site at Wexford Business Park where the bodies were discovered nearly three and a half years ago.
Unknown to authorities, 13 people crammed into the back of a container at the Belgium port of Zeebrugee in December 2001, expecting to arrive in either Britain or Ireland, where they were going to seek asylum.
Over the course of the 53-hour journey to Waterford and on to Wexford, eight of them suffocated due to lack of oxygen.
Six men and two young boys died, while four men and a woman survived.
A gang involved in human trafficking were subsequently sentenced in Turkey, some to eight years for manslaughter and some for two years for conspiracy.
