ATHENS, June 18: More than 40 illegal immigrants were rushed to a Greek hospital on Friday for a medical check-up after their bus caught fire, police said.

The immigrants, most from Pakistan, were suffering from dehydration and were detained at the city of Corinth, around 80 kilometres west of Athens, on their way from the eastern coast of the Peloponnese peninsula to the Greek capital.

Their condition was no cause for concern, Corinth hospital chief said. The immigrants told local police they arrived to Greece on a ship from the Turkish city of Cesme, across the Aegean sea.

Corinth police said authorities opened an investigation into what caused the bus blaze. EU member Greece lies on a major route for clandestine immigration from Asia and Africa to western Europe and would-be migrants are arrested almost daily. -AFP