Skopje - Twenty-two people died when a tourist boat sank Saturday in Ohrid Lake in Macedonia, local media reports said. The vessel, with mainly Bulgarian tourists on board, capsized some 200-300 metres offshore, the reports said.
Unofficial reports said there were between 45 and 62 people on board the vessel, built in 1924 in Regensburg, Germany, and licensed to carry 43 passengers.
The reports said the vessel had undergone a technical examination in recent months.
Witnesses told local media the vessel broke in two parts and sank within one minute.
First on the scene were people from a shoreside camping site. Police boats with diving equipment later arrived.
Unofficial reports said the boat was carrying twice as many passengers as were allowed. The tourists were on their way to the medieval monastery St. Naum.
Local media reported that the Bulgarian government will send a special plane to Ohrid to collect victims and survivors.
Lake Ohrid, the deepest in the Balkans, is Macedonia's most popular tourist destination, drawing tens of thousands of local and foreign tourists every year.
UNESCO declared both the lake and the town Ohrid as World heritage site in 1980.
