Up to 50 dead migrants found in truck in Austria

VIENNA – As regional leaders met Thursday to tackle Europe’s refugee crisis, a gruesome discovery unfolded a short drive from the Austrian capital: An abandoned truck was found with at least 20 – and possibly up to 50 – decomposing bodies of migrants piled inside.

It was the latest tragedy in a year that has seen tens of thousands of people risking all to seek a better life or refuge in wealthy European countries. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said at the Vienna conference she was “shaken by the awful news,” and summit participants held a minute of silence.

“This reminds us that we in Europe need to tackle the problem quickly and find solutions in the spirit of solidarity,” Merkel said.

Migrants fearful of death at sea in overcrowded and flimsy boats as they flee turmoil and war in the Middle East have increasingly turned to using a land route to Europe through the Western Balkans. But the discovery of the bodies in the truck on the main highway connecting Vienna to the Hungarian capital of Budapest showed there is no truly safe path.

Thousands cross from Greece daily with the help of smugglers, aiming to reach European Union countries such as Germany, Austria or Sweden and apply for asylum. The human traffickers may charge thousands of dollars per person, only to stuff them into trucks and vans so tightly that they often cannot move – or breathe.

Austrian police declined to say what killed those found in the truck, pending an investigation.

The state of decomposition made establishing identities and even the exact number of dead difficult. Senior police official Hans Peter Doskozil said that “20, 30, 40 – maybe 50” corpses were inside.

The truck was towed to an air-conditioned location near the border with Hungary where authorities would open it once temperatures had cooled enough to begin removing the bodies, said Doskozil, the chief of police in Burgenland province east of Vienna.

Autopsies would be conducted in the capital later, he said.

Officials found the driverless truck shortly before noon on the highway shoulder about 25 miles east of Vienna, near the town of Parndorf, and they originally believed it had mechanical trouble, said police spokesman Helmut Marban.

Then they saw blood dripping from the cargo area and noticed the smell of dead bodies, he said. Police quickly realized there were no survivors.