From: Berhane Habtemariam (Berhane.Habtemariam@gmx.de)
Date: Wed Apr 01 2009 - 14:20:19 EST
Bad weather caused Libyan migrant boat to sink-IOM
Wed Apr 1, 2009 3:45pm GMT
(Recasts with survivor accounts from IOM)
TRIPOLI, April 1 (Reuters) - Bad weather and passenger panic caused the
deadly sinking of a smugglers' boat off Libya this week, the International
Organisation for Migration (IOM) said on Wednesday.
Survivors told IOM staff that the smuggler, an Egyptian national, was among
those who drowned when the boat capsized three hours after it left Janzour,
15 km (9 miles) west of Tripoli, on Monday.
"The migrants said they had survived because they had stayed at the back of
the boat, the only part to have stayed afloat," the IOM said in a statement,
which said there were 257 people on board the ship, of whom 70 were women
and two were children.
About 20 migrants survived the accident, including one woman, it said. Many
survivors had kidney problems after having drunk sea water, but otherwise
appeared in good health.
Earlier on Wednesday, Libyan authorities said they recovered the bodies of
100 of the migrants trying to reach Europe.
"Seventy-seven bodies of the migrants washed up in the beach west of Tripoli
late on Tuesday and 23 more bodies were found between Sunday night and
Tuesday," an official told Reuters.
Estimates of the total number aboard the ship vary. Libyan officials believe
there were 365 people attempting the journey on the boat that was supposed
to hold only 75.
The migrants were Somalis, Nigerians, Eritreans, Kurds, Algerians,
Moroccans, Palestinians and Tunisians, according to the officials. The
ill-fated ship was one of four migrant boats which had sailed from Libya
between Saturday and Sunday, apparently heading to Italy.
Libyan coastguards had rescued 350 migrants, many of them women and
children, after their boat broke down on Sunday near a Libyan offshore
oilfield, they said.
"As for the fate of the two remaining boats, we have information that one
had reached Italy and the latest information we had about the other boat was
it had left Libyan waters and was spotted close to Malta," a Libyan official
said.
There are between 1 million and 1.5 million African migrants in Libya,
according to the IOM.
Libya is both a transit and a destination country for migrants. Most take
odd jobs to gather enough money to pay smugglers for the risky journey to
Italy.
IOM and Libyan officials say there appears to have been a surge in the
number of people using smugglers to leave North Africa, prompted by fears
that Libya and Italy would step up a crackdown on illegal migration next
month. Tripoli and Rome have reached an agreement on joint sea patrols to
try to stem the flow of illegal migrants. The accord becomes effective on
May 15. (Additional reporting by Laura MacInnis in Geneva) (Writing by
Lamine Ghanmi)
C Thomson Reuters 2009 All rights reserved
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