2,900 Migrants Die Trying To Cross Mediterranean Sea In 6 Months, Says IOM

The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) on Friday said 2,900 migrants died trying to reach Europe by crossing the Mediterranean Sea in the first half of the year.

The international migration group said the first six months of 2016 was considered the deadliest, adding that during the period under review, there were 2,899 recorded deaths at sea.

“This is around 50 per cent increase in the number of deaths when compared with the same period in 2015, when 1,838 migrants went missing or drowned at sea.

“In 2014, there were 743 deaths at sea by mid-year.

“We’ve had almost 3,000 people dead which is really alarming,” Joel Millman, Spokesman for the IOM told Reuters.

He added that “Europe’s done a remarkable job; they’ve saved thousands of lives this year alone. But almost 3,000 people dead means they’re not doing everything that needs to be done.”

Millman said he was not expecting migrant arrivals to decrease as insecurity in Libya, Syria and other war-torn countries is not likely to improve in the coming months.

“In first six months of this year, 225,665 migrants arrived in Italy, Greece, Cyprus and Spain by sea, with the central Mediterranean route to Italy claiming the most lives.

“This according to the report accounted for nearly 2,500 deaths.

“By this time last year, the number of arrivals by sea was just over 146,000,” he added.

Meanwhile, 10 women died in a sinking rubber boat off the coast of Libya on Thursday and an Italian ship rescued hundreds of other migrants, the Italian coastguard said.

The latest deaths came as Italy raised the wreck of a fishing boat that sank in April last year.

The disaster is feared to have killed up to 800 people, making it one of the deadliest shipwrecks in decades of seaborne migration from North Africa towards Europe. (Reuters/NAN)