MILAN (AP) – Italian coast guards have rescued 22 people and recovered nine bodies after a smuggler’s boat capsized in a storm about 50 kilometers (30 miles) south of Lampedusa, authorities said Thursday. Announced.
The steel-bottomed boat left Sfax, Tunisia, on Sunday night carrying 46 people from Guinea, Burkina Faso, Mali and Ivory Coast, survivors said. On Wednesday morning, the boat capsized as waves reached up to 5 meters (16 feet) and “the group became extremely agitated as the engine failed and they became adrift,” the U.N. refugee agency said.
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The victims included a six-month-old child and eight men, UNHCR said. Six of the survivors were treated for severe hypothermia and dehydration. Two people remain hospitalized.
In this image taken from a video released by the Italian Coast Guard on Thursday, April 11, 2024, a boat carrying migrants approaches a rescue operation off the coast of the Mediterranean island of Lampedusa. The Italian Coast Guard rescued 22 people and recovered nine bodies after a smuggler’s boat capsized in a storm about 30 miles south of Lampedusa on Thursday, April 10, 2024. (Guardia Costiera, Associated Press, HO)
Following the rescue in rough seas with waves reaching more than 2 1/2 meters (8 feet), the Coast Guard said it continued aerial surveillance of the area, which is within Malta’s search and rescue zone.
The number of river crossing attempts generally increases as summer approaches, raising fears of further shipwrecks, especially as Italian port regulations restrict the operation of charity rescue vessels. Italy’s far-right-led government has recently curtailed operations by directing charity vessels to northern ports for each rescue, and has seized ships for violating regulations.
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UNHCR Spokesperson Federico Fossi said: “As we have seen in recent weeks, more and more people are leaving the country in completely unseaworthy metal boats, and as the summer season approaches, the number of people at sea increases. We expect more accidents to occur.” Italy.
The International Organization for Migration has put the number of migrants missing along the deadly central Mediterranean route from northern Africa to Italy at 385 so far this year and 23,109 since it launched its Missing Migrants Project in 2014. I’m guessing it’s a person.
