Egyptian man who survived shipwreck denies causing Greece boat disaster

Ahmed Alkwrab thought his ordeal was over last June when he survived one of the deadliest shipwrecks ever recorded in the Mediterranean Sea and finally set foot on European soil.

Hours after a fishing trawler carrying hundreds of migrants capsized, however, the Egyptian housepainter found himself being interrogated by Greek authorities who then charged him and eight others with smuggling and causing the disaster.

If convicted, he would have faced life imprisonment.

"When they sat me in a room by myself and shut me in, the fear began. What's wrong? What's happened? Did I do anything?" he told Reuters.

"They're telling us that we are smugglers. Traffickers? No, no, no, no - that's not how it is at all."

Their arrests sparked outrage from international rights groups who said the migrants were being used as scapegoats for coastguard errors and that...