full screen A large number of migrants are feared to have lost their lives en route to the Italian island of Lampedusa. Archive image. Photo: Francisco Seco/AP/TT
More than 40 people are missing after a migrant boat capsized off the Italian island of Lampedusa, reports the UN agency IOM.
The migrant boat had set out from Sfax, Tunisia. On board were 46 people from Cameroon, Burkina Faso and Ivory Coast. During Thursday, the boat capsized in rough seas. Only a few survivors have been rescued.
– Among those missing are seven women and a child, says IOM spokesperson Flavio Di Giacomo.
In mid-June, an overloaded migrant boat sank in the Ionian Sea, off the coast of Greece. Of the around 750 people who are believed to have been on the boat, only about a hundred have been saved.