CASPER
New member
More than 200 migrants feared drowned off Libya
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
TRIPOLI (AFP) - At least 21 illegal migrants died and 213 are missing presumed dead after as many as three boats sank in a violent storm off Libya, the International Organisation for Migration said on Tuesday.
"A boat with 257 migrants on board sank on Sunday off the coast of Libya. Twenty-three people were saved and 21 bodies were retrieved", Laurence Hart, the IOM chief of mission in Tripoli, told AFP.
An earlier IOM toll out of the organisation's Geneva headquarters put the number of missing at 300.
Hart said Libyan coastguards were also searching for two other boats, but that "we don't yet know if these are fishing boats or had migrants on board."
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Geneva said on Tuesday that Egyptians, Tunisians and Africans were all aboard boats that that were wrecked around 30 kilometres (20 miles) off the Libyan coast.
"We are shocked by the reports of hundreds of people trying to reach Europe missing off the coast of Libya," UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond said in a statement.
"Details are still sketchy, but reports indicate a number of vessels carrying several hundred people set sail from the coast of Libya in the direction of Italy over the last few days.
"At least one boat reportedly went down and hundreds of people aboard are reported missing."
Twenty-three people "of African and Arab nationality" were saved by Libyan coastguards, Tuesday's edition of the private Libyan newspaper Oea said.
First reports of the disaster emerged late on Monday out of Egypt, with state news agency MENA quoting foreign ministry consular official Ahmed Rizq as saying a ship carrying more than 250 illegal migrants had gone down off Libya.
He told MENA that 20 people, including six Egyptians, were saved by Libyan rescue workers. Rizq said the boat had set sail from Sidi Bilal, near Tripoli, on Sunday morning.
"This is the beginning of the smuggling season in the Mediterranean," Redmond said on Tuesday.
"This tragic incident illustrates, once again, the dangers faced by people caught in mixed irregular movements of migrants and refugees in the Mediterranean and elsewhere which every year cost thousands of lives."
With 1,770 kilometres (1,106 miles) of coastline, Libya has become a popular destination country and transit point for immigrants from eastern and southern Africa heading for Europe.
On Monday, a Libyan interior ministry source said that an Italian tanker rescued 350 illegal migrants after their vessel ran into trouble.
A ship carrying illegal migrants bound for Europe also sank off the Libyan coast on Sunday, with 21 people drowning and an unknown number of people missing, the source added.
The UNHCR statement quoted High Commissioner Antonio Guterres as calling Sunday's sinking "the latest tragic example of a global phenomenon in which desperate people take desperate measures to escape conflict, persecution and poverty in search of a better life."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
TRIPOLI (AFP) - At least 21 illegal migrants died and 213 are missing presumed dead after as many as three boats sank in a violent storm off Libya, the International Organisation for Migration said on Tuesday.
"A boat with 257 migrants on board sank on Sunday off the coast of Libya. Twenty-three people were saved and 21 bodies were retrieved", Laurence Hart, the IOM chief of mission in Tripoli, told AFP.
An earlier IOM toll out of the organisation's Geneva headquarters put the number of missing at 300.
Hart said Libyan coastguards were also searching for two other boats, but that "we don't yet know if these are fishing boats or had migrants on board."
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Geneva said on Tuesday that Egyptians, Tunisians and Africans were all aboard boats that that were wrecked around 30 kilometres (20 miles) off the Libyan coast.
"We are shocked by the reports of hundreds of people trying to reach Europe missing off the coast of Libya," UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond said in a statement.
"Details are still sketchy, but reports indicate a number of vessels carrying several hundred people set sail from the coast of Libya in the direction of Italy over the last few days.
"At least one boat reportedly went down and hundreds of people aboard are reported missing."
Twenty-three people "of African and Arab nationality" were saved by Libyan coastguards, Tuesday's edition of the private Libyan newspaper Oea said.
First reports of the disaster emerged late on Monday out of Egypt, with state news agency MENA quoting foreign ministry consular official Ahmed Rizq as saying a ship carrying more than 250 illegal migrants had gone down off Libya.
He told MENA that 20 people, including six Egyptians, were saved by Libyan rescue workers. Rizq said the boat had set sail from Sidi Bilal, near Tripoli, on Sunday morning.
"This is the beginning of the smuggling season in the Mediterranean," Redmond said on Tuesday.
"This tragic incident illustrates, once again, the dangers faced by people caught in mixed irregular movements of migrants and refugees in the Mediterranean and elsewhere which every year cost thousands of lives."
With 1,770 kilometres (1,106 miles) of coastline, Libya has become a popular destination country and transit point for immigrants from eastern and southern Africa heading for Europe.
On Monday, a Libyan interior ministry source said that an Italian tanker rescued 350 illegal migrants after their vessel ran into trouble.
A ship carrying illegal migrants bound for Europe also sank off the Libyan coast on Sunday, with 21 people drowning and an unknown number of people missing, the source added.
The UNHCR statement quoted High Commissioner Antonio Guterres as calling Sunday's sinking "the latest tragic example of a global phenomenon in which desperate people take desperate measures to escape conflict, persecution and poverty in search of a better life."
