ANKARA, July 26: Turkish coastguards on Saturday stopped a small fishing boat loaded with 257 would-be Turkish immigrants attempting to illegally enter Europe, a local official said.

The boat was found off the popular holiday resort of Fethiye in southern Turkey by a coastguard boat on a routine patrol, Fethiye governor Cengizhan Aksoy told the Anatolia news agency.

There was no captain or crew aboard the Turkish-registered boat.

Most of the would-be immigrants were unemployed people from the country’s mainly Kurdish southeast, and also included 17 women and 29 children, Aksoy added.—AFP