New evidence have cast doubt on the Greek coastguard’s account of Wednesday’s migrant shipwreck in which hundreds including scores of Pakistanis are feared to have dies.
According to a BBC investigative report, analysis of the movement of other ships in the area suggests the overcrowded fishing vessel was not moving for at least seven hours before it capsized.
The Greek coastguard still claims that during these hours the boat was on a course to Italy and not in need of rescue.
Greek authorities have not yet responded to the BBC's findings.
At least 78 people are known to have died, but the UN says up to 500 are still missing.
The UN has called for an investigation into Greece's handling of the disaster, amid claims more action should have been taken earlier to initiate a full-scale rescue attempt.
Greek officials maintain those on board said they did not want help and were not in danger until just before their boat sank.
The BBC has obtained a computer animation of tracking data provided by Marine Traffic, a maritime analytics platform.
Their data shows hours of activity focused on a small, specific area where the migrant boat later sank, casting doubt on the official claim it had no problems with its navigation.
The fishing boat had no tracker so is not shown on the map. Neither are coastguard and military vessels which do not have to share their location.
Timeline of official coastguard account challenged
Frontex, the EU's border force, says it first spotted the migrant boat at around 08:00 GMT on Tuesday and informed the Greek authorities.
Alarm Phone, an emergency hotline for migrants in trouble at sea, say they received a call at 12:17 GMT saying the boat was in distress.
We have used video and photographs authenticated by BBC Verify, as well as court records and shipping logs, to analyse the movement of vessels in the area in the following hours.
The Marine Traffic animation shows a ship called the Lucky Sailor abruptly turning north at 15:00 GMT.
The owner of the Lucky Sailor gave us its log book and confirmed it had been asked by the Coastguard to approach the migrant boat and give food and water.
About half-an-hour later at 15:35 GMT, the coastguard helicopter found the migrant boat. Authorities have continued to claim it was on a steady course at the time.
But two-and-a-half hours later at around 18:00 GMT, another vessel, the Faithful Warrior, travelled to the same area and also gave supplies to the boat.
The owners of Faithful Warrior referred BBC to the investigating authorities.
Video has emerged - reportedly shot from the Faithful Warrior - claiming to show supplies being delivered to the migrant ship via a rope in the water. No other ships can be seen.
BBC Verify checked it and found the vessel - which is not moving in the footage - matched the shape of the migrant ship seen in photos and the weather conditions were a match for those reported at the time. It's not known exactly when this video was filmed.
Between 19:40 until 22:40, Greek officials originally claimed the boat was keeping a "steady course and speed". Their initial statement claimed they observed from a discreet distance, but a close-up image they later published - from this time-period - suggests the migrant boat is not going anywhere.
A government spokesperson later said the coastguard had attempted to board the boat to assess the danger but that those on board removed a rope that had been attached and did not want help.
All of the shipping activity of the previous seven hours was focused around one specific spot, suggesting the migrant boat had hardly moved.
The scale of the animated map suggests it travelled less than a few nautical miles, which may be expected of a stricken vessel buffeted by the wind and the waves in the deepest part of the Mediterranean Sea.
The actions of people in distress, rocking the vessel, would also have contributed any movement.
During this time period, Greek officials have insisted it was not in trouble and was instead safely on its way to Italy and so the coastguard didn't attempt a rescue.
At 23:00, the boat sank with hundreds on board and the tracking animation shows a frenzy of ships coming to help.
This included the Celebrity Beyond from which footage of the aftermath of the disaster was filmed and later sent to the BBC.
A luxury yacht, the Mayan Queen, is then instructed to help take some of the 104 survivors ashore.
Those rescued reached the safety at the port of Kalamata but left behind a series of troubling questions about the whole Greek response.
Pakistanis ‘were forced below deck’
Pakistani nationals appear to have been singled out on the fishing boat that sank off Greece last Wednesday with hundreds of passengers feared dead, said a report published in Guardian,
Macabre details have emerged of conditions on the boat, as questions mount over whether the Greek coastguard “covered up” its role in the tragedy. With about 500 people still feared missing, new accounts from survivors indicate that women and children were forced to travel in the hold, and that certain nationalities were condemned to the most dangerous part of the trawler.
According to leaked testimonies told by survivors to coastguards, Pakistanis were forced below deck, with other nationalities allowed on the top deck, where they had a far greater chance of surviving a capsize.
The testimonies suggest women and children were effectively “locked up” in the hold, ostensibly to be “protected” by men on the overcrowded vessel. The Observer has learned that Pakistani nationals were also kept below deck, with crew members maltreating them when they appeared in search of fresh water or tried to escape.
No women or children are thought to be among the survivors, while reports from Pakistan on Saturday indicate hundreds of its citizens may have died when the rusty trawler sank off the Peloponnese peninsula. Local media reported that at least 298 Pakistanis died, 135 from the Pakistani side of Kashmir.
One estimate indicated about 400 Pakistanis were on board. The country’s ministry of foreign affairs has so far confirmed that only 12 of the 78 survivors were from Pakistan.
Conditions on the boat were so bleak that even before it sank there had already been six deaths after it ran out of fresh water.
Nawal Soufi, a Moroccan-Italian social worker and activist, added that passengers were pleading for help a day before it sank. “I can testify that these people were asking to be saved by any authority,” she said. Her account contradicts that of the Greek government, which said passengers told the coastguard no request for help was made because they wanted to go to Italy.
New testimony also indicates that the trawler’s engine failed days before it sank, making it likely the crew would have sought help. “We started the journey at dawn on Friday. Around 700 of us were on board,” one migrant is recorded as saying in testimony taken by coastguards overseeing the inquiry into the disaster. “We were travelling for three days and then the engine failed.”
Four days after one of the worst disasters in the Mediterranean in recent years, the discrepancy is only one of a series of unanswered questions, including what prompted the vessel to capsize. Of concern are claims that it overturned in the early hours of Wednesday because a rope was attached by coastguards, allegations rejected by Greek officials.
At first, the coastguard said it had kept a “discreet distance” from the boat, but on Friday a government spokesman confirmed a rope had been thrown to “stabilise” the boat.
Maurice Stierl, of the Institute for Migration Research and Intercultural Studies at Osnabrück University in Germany, said: “The Hellenic coastguard speaks of a sudden shift in weight. So what caused the sudden shift in weight? Was there a panic on board? Did something happen during the attempt to provide them with something? Or was it towed? And due to this towing, did the boat go down?”
There are also questions over whether the Greek coastguard should have intervened earlier to escort the ageing trawler to safety. Government officials have confirmed patrol boats and cargo ships had been shadowing the trawler since Tuesday afternoon.
Some believe the failure to intervene cannot be explained by incompetence. Stierl accused many EU countries of “weaponising time” by delaying rescue as long as they can, or what he called a “phase of strategic neglect and abandonment.” He said: “They have managed to build in delays into European engagement at sea. They’re actively sort of hiding, in fact, from migrant boats, so that they are not drawn into rescue operations. We can see how a strategy is being created, that slows down –actively and consciously slows down – rescue efforts.”
On Monday attention will turn to the alleged Egyptian smuggling ring in charge of the vessel, with nine suspects due in court.