VIENNA: Austrian police said on Saturday that they had intercepted another truck containing 26 migrants and that three young children had to be hospitalised.

“The three small children had to be hospitalised... because of the extremely bad state of their health. Doctors said they were treated for severe dehydration,” police said in a statement about the incident on Friday morning.

“If the journey had continued the situation could probably have become critical,” a spokesman from police in Upper Austria state said.

The vehicle, pulled over by police after a chase, contained 26 “illegal foreigners” from Syria, Bangladesh and Afghanistan who said they wanted to go to Germany, police said.

The incident happened near Braunau am Inn in western Austria close to the border with Germany. The Romanian driver, who had refused to pull over for a routine check, was arrested.

Published in Dawn, August 30th, 2015

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