70 Dead Refugees, Including Four Children, Found in Abandoned Austrian Truck
Authorities have released new information regarding the truck filled with dead refugees that was abandoned on a Vienna highway yesterday, and it’s grisly: there were reportedly more than 70 bodies inside, including at least 8 women and 4 children.
Although the bodies have not yet been identified, investigators are operating under the theory that the group were Syrian refugees sneaking into Austria from Hungary.
“We must assume now that these are refugees,” local police chief Hans Peter Doskozil said during a news conference. “It is possible this is a Syrian refugee group.”
The bodies, which had already begun to decompose, were discovered Thursday morning “after a highway patrol officer investigated a putrid smell and liquid coming from the back of a truck abandoned near the Austrian village of Parndorf on the main expressway between Vienna and Budapest,” the Washington Post reports.
Initial estimates put the death count at somewhere between 20 and 50—a gross underestimation. Overnight forensic work now puts the tally at 71, according to a police spokesperson, who says the group probably suffocated inside the truck.
Still, Austrian authorities aren’t exactly sympathetic to the plight of the refugees, hundreds of thousands of whom flee through Europe each year: they’ve reportedly announced plans “geared more toward blocking than aiding asylum-seekers,” including increased border controls.
