Twenty migrants are missing after their boat sank in the Mediterranean Sea, near the Italian island of Lampedusa, the Italian branch of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said today.
“Twenty people have been reported missing in the Mediterranean following a shipwreck on September 1, according to survivors,” wrote the UNHCR representative in Italy, Chiara Cardoletti, on the social network X (formerly Twitter).
“The seven survivors, welcomed by our team in Lampedusa, are in critical condition. Many of them will have lost family members” in the disaster, she added.
For its part, the Italian media reports that 21 people are missing, including three children, and that the survivors, Syrian citizens rescued by the Italian coastguard, reported that 28 people left Libya on September 1 and that, after a day's journey, the accident occurred.
In 2023, more than 3,000 migrants were reported missing after attempting to cross the Mediterranean, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
According to data from the Italian Ministry of the Interior, the number of migrants entering the country by sea has dropped considerably since the beginning of this year: 43,061 people arrived in Italy between January 1 and today, September 4, compared to 115,177 during the same period in 2023.
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