21 illegal migrants drown off Libyan coast en route to Italy
21 illegal migrants were missing and probably drowned after a rubber dinghy and a wooden boat set off from Libya for Italy and had to be rescued, the International Organisation for Migration said on Tuesday.
The 21 people missing were all among the 51 on the wooden boat, and two dead infants had reportedly been discovered on board, bringing the likely death toll to 23, IOM spokesman Joel Millman told a regular UN briefing in Geneva. All 132 people on the rubber dinghy were rescued, he said.
Both incidents happened on Saturday, but survivors had only just reached the port of Pozzallo in Italy, Millman said. Other survivors were shipped back to Libya.
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