UPDATE 1-Libyan coastguard turns back nearly 500 migrants after altercation with NGO ship
* NGO ship said coastguard endangered its crew
* Many on migrant boat from Morocco, Bangladesh
* Migrants crossing from Libya in record numbers (Updates number and nationalities of migrants)
By Ahmed Elumami
TRIPOLI, May 11 (Reuters) - Libya's coastguard said it had intercepted nearly 500 migrants packed onto a wooden boat and returned them to Tripoli on Wednesday after warning off a ship that was preparing to pick them up for passage to Europe.
Footage filmed by Sea-Watch, a non-governmental organisation, showed a Libyan coastguard vessel coming within metres of its own ship as it sped to stop the migrants.
Tripoli coastguard spokesman Ayoub Qassem said the incident occurred about 19 miles (30 km) north of Libya's coast.
It highlighted the confusion in the crowded waters as desperate migrants try to reach a better life and authorities scramble to deal with the chaos.
"An international rescue organisation called Sea-Watch tried to hinder the work of our coastguard ... in a bid to take the migrants, claiming Libya is not safe for migrants," he said.
Qassem said the coastguard had also exchanged fire with smugglers, but gave no details.
Ruben Neugebauer, a spokesman for Sea-Watch, said the NGO had received instruction from Italy's coastguard control centre in Rome that the Libyan coastguard would be taking over "on-scene command", and that the Sea-Watch ship had stopped to await further instructions.
"Without any warning, they crossed our bow on the way to the migrant boat," Neugebauer said. "They made an extremely dangerous manoeuvre. They nearly hit our boat, they endangered our crew."
Libya is the main departure point for migrants hoping to reach Europe by sea. The country has been in turmoil for years and migrants living there or passing through say they are subject to a range of abuses. A record 181,000 made the trip in 2016 and arrivals in Italy so far this year are up 30 percent. Most are from sub-Saharan Africa.
PERILOUS JOURNEY
Most migrants attempt the perilous journey on flimsy inflatable boats provided by smugglers that are barely equipped to make it to international waters. Larger wooden boats carrying several hundred migrants are rarer.
Some migrants are turned back by the Libyan coastguard, which generally delivers them to detention centres notorious for poor conditions and ill-treatment. The coastguard is receiving training from the European Union as it seeks to limit migrant departures and deaths.
Other migrants are taken to Italy after being picked up by NGO ships that run rescue missions, European or Italian naval and coastguard patrols, and other international vessels.
Qassem said the wooden boat intercepted on Wednesday was carrying nearly 300 Moroccans, 145 Bangladeshis, 23 Tunisians, and other migrants from elsewhere in Africa and the Middle East.
Those on board said they had left the western Libyan city of Sabratha on Tuesday night. There were about 20 women, some five of whom were being taken for medical treatment as they arrived in Tripoli. One appeared to be seriously ill.
One 24-year-old Moroccan man said he had come to Libya five weeks earlier in order to try to reach Europe. A 28-year-old man, also Moroccan, said he had been working in Libya for four years, but had decided to leave because the situation was deteriorating.
A Syrian woman on board said she had travelled through six countries to reach Libya, paying $1,000 in each and leaving two sons aged 12 and 13 behind in Jordan.
"I wanted to leave for Europe," she said. "It was an attempt to get a better life and reunite my whole family in Europe, but unfortunately we couldn't make it." (Additional reporting by Steve Scherer in Rome; Writing by Aidan Lewis; Editing by Gareth Jones and Alison Williams)
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Italy arrests Libyan suspected of involvement in migrant murder
CATANIA, Sicily May 11 (Reuters) - Italy has arrested a Libyan man suspected of involvement in the killing last week of a migrant, who was shot dead when he refused to take off his baseball cap, police said on Thursday.
Police on the island of Sicily said a group of migrants had been packed on a motorised rubber dinghy and were heading from Libya towards Italy when a group of people smugglers drew alongside and ordered that they remove their hats.
Seconds later, Kellie Osman, 21, from Sierra Leone, was shot by one of the smugglers.
Police said in a statement that the gunman had not been identified, however, they said aerial video showed Libyan suspect Abouzid Nouredine Alhadi had boarded the dinghy from the smugglers' boat and had tried to blend in as another migrant.
A second Libyan had boarded another boat packed with migrants and he has also been detained and faces people-smuggling charges, police said on Thursday.
More than 43,000 people have reached Italy from Libya so far this year, the U.N. refugee agency says, many of them facing violence and intimidation during the dangerous journey.
Libyan gangs have taken advantage of a breakdown in law and order in the north African country to make a lucrative business from packing sub-Saharan Africans into rickety boats bound for southern Europe.
Separately, police said three Nigerians were detained in Sicily on Thursday and face charges of allegedly killing, torturing and sexually assaulting other Africans while they were trapped in Libya awaiting a passage to Italy.
According to survivors, the three men, who arrived in Sicily last month with hundreds of migrants, had acted as jailers at a disused military base in Sabratha, Libya, where the would-be migrants were held for ransom.
Some of their prisoners were beaten so badly that they later died. The three also allegedly took payments for packing migrants onto rickety boats. (Reporting by Isla Binnie; Editing by Crispian Balmer and Alison Williams)
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