New migrant boat sinks in Mediterranean
August 12, 2015
On Wednesday, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) reported that about 50 people remained missing after Italian officials had pulled another 50 from Mediterranean waters the day before. The navy reportedly picked up the migrants after a military helicopter spotted their rubber dinghy sinking and apparently dropped life rafts to the passengers before the boat eventually sank.
Authorities brought 54 people to the island of Lampedusa, but survivors say the craft set off with between 117 and 120 passengers, all of them from sub-Saharan Africa, according to the IOM. A helicopter later airlifted to safety two migrants seen hanging onto a floating barrel near where the dinghy had sunk, the navy reported. Authorities also pulled 1,500 people from seven other Mediterranean vessels in the past 24 hours.
The UN reports that 250,000 migrants - many of whom have fled conflict zones or environmental and economic destruction in Africa and the Middle East - have crossed to Europe by sea this year, of whom 98,000 have arrived in Italy and 124,000 in Greece. Italy reportedly took in just 170,000 migrants in 2014.
Mounting death toll
The Mediterranean has become the world's most deadly border zone for migrants. More than 2,000 migrants and refugees have died so far this year in attempts to reach Europe by boat, compared with 3,279 deaths during the whole of last year, the IOM reported last week.
About 200 migrants presumably drowned earlier this month off the coast of Libya when their boat capsized. Officials reportedly saved more than 400 people from that shipwreck.
Migrants' journeys do not end when they reach European soil. Many face racial profiling, even within the nominally borderless Schengen Zone. Some European officials have called for easing of EU migration policy to save lives. However, that would likely only apply to migrants from certain nations deemed officially unsafe.
On Tuesday, Greek police used fire extinguishers and batons against migrants awaiting official papers in a stadium on the island of Kos housing hundreds of people, including small children, after protests broke out against the holding center's harsh conditions.
mkg/kms (Reuters, AFP)