On Saturday the Italian navy said at least 40 migrants had died, probably from suffocation after inhaling fumes from fuel.
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On Sunday, a Norwegian vessel participating in a European rescue-and-patrol mission in the Mediterranean was bringing the bodies and more than 300 survivors from the boat toward Sicily.
An Italian Navy helicopter was about 21 nautical miles off the Libyan coast when they spotted the boat.
The scenes, captured early Saturday by Associated Press journalists, came as Turkish authorities reported that 2,791 migrants have been rescued in the Aegean Sea in the past five days; most are Syrians.
Human traffickers in Libya charge migrants between $1,200 and $1,800 for a place on deck, about half that for positions in the hold.
But even before they get to the lawless country, where most smugglers’ boats are launched towards Italy, people coming from sub-Saharan Africa or the Middle East are driven for weeks through the desert in overcrowded pick-up trucks.
There have been just under 135,000 migrants arriving in Greece via Turkey, and along with migrants landing in Spain and Malta, the agency says 237,000 people have made the crossing so far in 2015 – up from 219,000 for all of 2014.
The Geneva-based global Organisation for Migration has said numbers of migrants trying to reach Europe by sea is heading for a record figure this year.
Italian Interior Minister Angelino Alfano has warned that the fresh tragedy will be not the last one if the anarchy into which Libya has descended after the civil war which toppled former leader Muammar Gaddafi is not solved.
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Migrants by the tens of thousands are braving the perilous journey across the Mediterranean, hoping to reach Europe and be granted asylum. Another 201 people rescued by a boat operated by Doctors Without Borders (MSF) were due to arrive on Sunday in Sicily.
