The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) on Friday reported that smugglers in Libya pushed reluctant migrants into a boat at gunpoint before it sank.
The incident occurred a day after some 240 people were reported dead or missing in two major Mediterranean shipwrecks.
International Organisation for Migration (IOM) said in Geneva that the Italian coastguard had brought 27 survivors and 12 bodies from the first shipwreck to the island of Lampedusa.
IOM added that the coastguards also brought two survivors from the second shipwreck.
A young Liberian woman who lost her son, daughter and brother in one of the accidents, told a UNICEF worker that she had paid smugglers 2,400 dollars to bring her family to Italy.
However, she and others refused to get on the boat because it did not seem safe for them.
“But the smugglers shot at them and forced them to go,’’ UNICEF aid worker, Helena Rodriguez, said.
According to UNICEF, many victims were West Africans from Senegal, Liberia, Guinea and Nigeria.
The UN-affiliated aid and advocacy organisation, IOM, said the latest tragedy had pushed this year’s death toll in the Mediterranean to a record 4,220, well above 2015’s total of 3,770.
Flavio Di Giacomo, IOM spokesman in Rome, said there had been an unusual October spike in migrant arrivals to Italy – 27,388, the highest monthly figure in 2016.
“This could be explained by testimonies picked up by IOM staff in Italy.
“The traffickers are telling migrants that if they do not move now they will face a higher risk of being caught by Libyan coastguard patrols due to start soon,’’ the spokesman said.
Amid growing complaints by Roman authorities about insufficient EU solidarity, Di Giacomo said nearly 160,000 migrants had arrived in Italy since January – a 13 per cent increase compared to the first 10 months of 2015.
Meanwhile, Pope Francis, a well-known champion of migrants’ rights, renewed calls for greater international solidarity towards countries that take in refugees, using an unusual video format to deliver his message.
“Can a country alone manage the problems of forced migration?
“We must move away from indifference and the fear of accepting each other, because that other could be you or me.
“Join me in this prayer request: that the countries which take in a great number of displaced persons and refugees may find support for their efforts which show solidarity,’’ Francis stressed. (dpa/NAN)