Hopes fade of finding survivors of migrant boat tragedy

ROME: Hopes faded of finding survivors of the latest Mediterranean boat tragedy, in which an estimated 200 migrants drowned, and rescue ships sailed to the aid of more migrant boats yesterday.

Meanwhile Australia has been turning back large numbers trying to reach its shores.

Vessels from the Italian and Irish navies and humanitarian agency Médecins sans Frontières (MSF) saved more than 370 people from a capsized boat thought to be carrying up to 600 on Wednesday.

The Italian coast guard said they recovered 25 bodies but found no more survivors after scouring the waters overnight.

Reports put about 700 passengers on the overcrowded fishing boat, but interviews with survivors reduced that estimate.

Seas were very calm yesterday and already two rescue operations were under way near the site of the disaster, said a Reuters photographer aboard the privately funded Phoenix, a vessel run by MSF and the Migrant Offshore Aid Station.

The capsized boat flipped over on Wednesday as an Irish rescue vessel approached, probably because desperate passengers surged to one side as they spotted the ship, Le Niamh, on its way to help.

The Irish ship is part of the EU Triton mission, which was expanded after up to 800 migrants drowned in April.

The Mediterranean Sea is the world’s most deadly border area for migrants. More than 2 000 migrants and refugees have died this year in attempts to reach Europe by boat.

People smugglers, mostly based in Libya and charging thousands of dollars for passage, have sent more than 90 000 migrants by sea to Italy so far this year

This summer’s mass arrivals in both Italy and Greece show Europe’s migrant crisis is worsening as those fleeing violence and poverty continue to pour in from Africa and the Middle East.

Many of the newcomers look to move swiftly to wealthier northern Europe, including to Britain from Calais, France.

In Calais, nightly attempts by large groups of migrants to force their way through the rail tunnel linking France and Britain have provoked public anger and disrupted the flow of goods between the two.

Australia has turned around more than 600 asylum seekers trying to reach its shores on 20 separate boats since enacting controversial new border controls in December 2013, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said yesterday.

Australia has vowed to stop asylum seekers reaching its shores, turning boats back to Indonesia when it can, and sending those it cannot to camps in impoverished Papua New Guinea and Nauru for long-term detention.

The United Nations and human rights groups have criticised Australia over its tough asylum-seeker policies, which conservative Prime Minister Tony Abbott has further strengthened and defended as necessary to stop deaths at sea.

In June, reports that Australia paid people smugglers bound for Australia thousands of dollars to turn their boat back to Indonesia caused tensions with Jakarta, plunging relations to their lowest point in more than a year. – Reuters