‘Where are they?’: anguish grows among relatives of missing after Greek shipwreck

Kassem Abo Zeed holds up a phone displaying a photo of himself with his wife, who is missing. Photograph: Thanassis Stavrakis/AP

Hope dies last and for Kassem Abo Zeed it was running out fast. Hope was the force that had led him to board a plane from Hamburg and fly to Greece after he heard that a boat carrying his wife had capsized off the country’s southern coast.

But by 2pm on Thursday, 36 hours after the blue fishing trawler packed with migrants and refugees had sunk in one of the worst maritime disasters in recent Greek history, hope was fading in a way he had prayed would never happen.