Seventy would-be immigrants to Europe from Africa perished when their boat sank in the Mediterranean Sea, eight companions rescued off Malta said.
If their statements are confirmed, it would be one of the worst such incidents ever recorded off Malta, a target destination for Africans trying to reach Europe.
The survivors were plucked out of the water on Wednesday by a Maltese fishing vessel, the Madonna di Pompei, from a semi-submerged dinghy 70km off Malta, then transferred to a military patrol boat.
PHOTO: EPA
An Armed Forces of Malta twin-engine Islander patrol aircraft went out to the area to look for other survivors, but none were found.
It earlier emerged during police questioning that the original group consisted of 79 people — all men, apart from eight women, four of them pregnant, and one child.
But a UN official later placed the original number at 78.
Investigations were continuing, a police spokesman said.
The passengers, all African, had apparently set sail from Libya last on Thursday last week and hit bad weather, said Neil Falzon, a representative of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Malta, who met with the survivors.
Four of the dead were women, three of them pregnant, he said.
“On Monday, the rubber dinghy started taking water and it overturned,” Falzon said. “They just kept holding on to the dinghy until last night they were spotted by the Maltese fishing vessel.”
He identified the immigrants as Eritreans, Ghanaians, Somalians and Sudanese, news reports said.
Malta, the smallest of the 27 EU member states, is a target for Africans trying to get into Europe by boat from North Africa, with Libya being the most common point of departure.
Some 1,700 illegal immigrants landed on Malta last year, according to an AFP count.
On Sunday, more than 100 illegal immigrants were brought ashore in two separate operations off Malta.
The last case of serious loss of life off Malta came in May last year when 53 would-be immigrants perished at sea.
“Notwithstanding that they know about [previous] tragedies, these desperate people still try and make the journey,” Falzon said.
Some 380 would-be immigrants have died at sea over the first six months of this year in the Sicily Canal alone, Doctors Without Borders estimates.
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