Two sailors dead in Greek ferry rescue

Two sailors involved in efforts to secure a stricken Greek ferry on which ten people died have been killed in the operation.

Two Albanian seamen who took part in the rescue operation for the Norman Atlantic ferry have died from injuries suffered in an accident, the Italian navy says.

The merchant sailors were on board a tugboat when the cables attaching it to the stricken ferry snapped, the navy said.

Hundreds of people have been rescued and 10 people are dead following a fire that broke out while the ferry was off the coast of Corfu.

Dionis Dulaj, the police spokesman in the Albanian port town of Vlore, said the two Albanian sailors were apparently hit by a rope they had been trying to attach to the Norman Atlantic, which has been drifting rudderless near Vlore.

An extensive rescue operation saved more than 400 people from the ferry.