[WATCH] Fishermen rescue baby after refugee boat capsizes

Harrowing footage has emerged showing Turkish fishermen rescuing an 18-month-old boy in a lifejacket in the sea of the Aegean province after a refugee boat carrying him and other asylum-seekers capsized last Wednesday.

Video of the incident shows how the fishermen from the Aegean town of Kuşadasi find the toddler, now identified as Muhammad Hasan, floating in the water as the boat sailed from Turkey to Greece.

Initially believing he was dead, it was only when the boy started to make noises that they realised he was alive and immediately pulled him out of the water to administer first aid. They also found another group of refugees floating in their lifejackets nearby.

“He was all pale. We suspected hypothermia as he was cold and his hands and feet were all white. He was also frothing at the mouth. We covered the baby with a blanket, tried to rescue him. After our call, a tow boat from the harbour arrived to help us before taking the baby to Kuşadasi,” Recep Evran, the captain of the boat, told the newspaper Hürriyet, after the incident on Thursday.

According to reports, at least two refugees died and 16 others went missing in two separate accidents when boats heading to Greece from Turkey capsized off the Aegean coast.

The Turkish coastguard was still searching for missing refugees.

The rescuers said they helped 15 other people out of the water, adding that most of those floating were women crying for help, including one who was pregnant. They said that the group had been in the water for about five hours before they were found by the fishermen, who then alerted the coastguard.

Meanwhile, the bodies of 29 people thought to be asylum-seekers have been discovered on Libyan beaches around the city of Zliten, 100 miles (160km) east of Tripoli, the Red Crescent said.

Spokesman Mohamed al-Misrati said the humanitarian agency was alerted by local residents and 25 bodies were initially discovered, followed by another four. The Red Crescent feared that several more bodies may be found on Sunday. The dead are thought to be from Africa.

So far more than 2,600 refugees are known to have drowned while trying to cross the Mediterranean Sea to reach Europe in 2015, according to the International Organisation for Migration.