Forty-one migrants, including three children, have died in a shipwreck off the Italian island of Lampedusa, after a small boat which had set off from Sfax in Tunisia capsized and sank in the Strait of Sicily.
Four people survived the shipwreck, three men and one woman originally from Ivory Coast and Guinea. They were rescued by a Maltese cargo ship and taken to Lampedusa by the Italian Coast Guard, according to Italian newswire ANSA.
The four survivors told the Coast Guard that 45 people had left Sfax. After about six hours of navigation, the 7-meter metal boat capsized due to a large wave and all 45 migrants ended up in the sea. Authorities have not yet recovered the bodies.
According to the International Organization for Migration, since the beginning of the year, 2,387 people have died or gone missing in the Mediterranean while trying to reach European shores.
In Brussels, Giorgia Meloni’s far-right Italian government has been pushing to review rules on how the EU welcomes and relocates migrants, asking for more authority to remove rejected asylum seekers.
Last month, the EU finalized a deal with Tunisia — a common departure point for people seeking asylum in Europe — which essentially offers the country millions of euros in exchange for help blocking the boats that have been carrying a growing number of people to Europe.
Around 1,100 migrants of the 1,577 currently hosted in Lampedusa will be transferred Wednesday to Porto Empedocle and Augusta, two towns in Sicily, Italian newspaper La Stampa reported.
