About 40 migrants believed to have drowned when their boat sank in the Mediterranean near the Libyan coast.
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“My colleagues are interviewing the survivors… who arrived this afternoon in Augusta (Sicily), and they are talking of 35 to 40 people missing at sea”, said the UNHCR’s spokesperson in Italy, Federico Fossi, who told AFP of the accident on Wednesday. One survivor recalled how the boat started taking in water and the weak rubber began to deteriorate as the boat sunk. Earlier this month, the UN said some 137,000 people had arrived in Greece, Italy, Spain and Malta alone, with many more coming by land across the Balkans.
A child cheers at the photographer as migrants sit after…
The European Commission also unveiled a voluntary plan last month for its member states to deal with the influx of tens of thousands of migrants travelling to Europe via the Mediterranean.
According to the statement made on the Italian coast guard command’s Twitter account, 451 migrants were taken in within the scope of Operation Triton. Two other boats brought a further 669 immigrants to and during the day.
ROME (AP) – As many as 40 would-be refugees, including at least seven children, have died while trying to reach Italy from Libya in the latest Mediterranean migrant tragedy, Save the Children reported Thursday.
All the dead came from sub-Saharan countries such as Senegal, Mali and Benin.
Numerous migrants travel from as far as Darfur and Afghanistan, making long road journeys in the back of lorries to reach the departure points in Turkey and Libya.
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More than 1,800 migrants have died – a 20-fold increase on the same period in 2014.
