11 dead, 200 missing in fresh refugee shipwrecks in Mediterranean
At least 11 people have reportedly been killed and 200 more people remain unaccounted for following two separate shipwrecks involving refugees in the central Mediterranean.
The Libyan Red Crescent said on Monday that bodies of 10 women and one child were found on a beach in Zawiya, 50 kilometers (31 miles) west of Tripoli.
Reports say they had been among 132 passengers on board an inflatable craft, which had left Libya early Friday and then overturned hours later after deflating.
The Alexander Maersk, a Danish container ship, picked up 50 survivors of the incident in international waters off the coast of Libya and brought them to Italy.
The survivors then told officials from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) that women and children were among the passengers of the refugee boat.
Meanwhile, Libyan fishermen and coastguards managed to rescue seven refugees off the coast of the Libyan capital on Sunday.
The survivors said in interviews with the IOM officials that they had set out on a boat with at least 120 people on board. About 30 women and nine children were aboard the boat when it sank, the survivors said.
Italian officials said a total of 6,000 refugees were rescued in the Mediterranean and brought to Italy on Friday. Libyans also rescued several hundred in their waters.
A historic flow of refugees began to hit the shores of Europe in 2015 when wars in the Middle East and Africa left millions homeless.
Refugees initially took the route in the eastern Mediterranean to reach Greece. A deal between the European Union and Turkey in March last year shifted the flow to the central Mediterranean, which includes a more dangerous route from Libya to Italy.
Around 250,000 people have arrived in Italy this year, showing a 50-percent surge compared with the opening months of 2016. The country accepted some 500,000 refugees in the three years spanning 2014-16.
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