Race to find survivors
Hundreds fleeing Libya to Europe may have perished
European officials will hold an emergency meeting today to confront a growing humanitarian crisis after the presumed deaths Sunday of hundreds of people aboard a smuggler’s boat.
The boat, carrying up to 950 people fleeing Libya’s coast for Europe, capsized in what could be the Mediterranean’s deadliest migrant disaster. Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat called it the “biggest human tragedy of the last few years.”
Survivor accounts about the number of people on board varied from 700 to 950, the Associated Press reported. On Sunday, 28 survivors and 24 bodies were pulled from the water, Italian Premier Matteo Renzi said.
A survivor from Bangladesh said about 300 people were in the hold of the 66-foot fishing boat when it overturned, and about 200 women and dozens of children were also on board, Italian prosecutor Giovanni Salvi told the AP. He said there was no confirmation yet of that account.
Muscat told BBC News that rescuers were “literally trying to find people alive among the dead floating in the water.”
Tens of thousands flee chaos in North Africa and the Middle East for Europe and risk death while crossing the Mediterranean. The latest capsizing prompted European officials and Pope Francis to call for action to stop the tide of migration. The European Union’s foreign minister, Federica Mogherini, added migration as an emergency issue to today’s meeting in Luxembourg.
The pope urged leaders to act decisively to stop these tragedies. “These are men and women like us, brothers seeking a better life.”
“Biggest human tragedy of the last few years.” Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat