Sea rescue saves 941 migrants off north coast of Libya

Rescued migrants wait to disembark from an Italian Coast Guard vessel in Porto Empedocle, Sicily, southern Italy. Image by (AP Photo/Francesco Malavolta)

In a dramatic sea rescue north of Libya, a flotilla of rescue ships saved nearly 1,000 migrants and refugees, while 10 migrants perished in the southern Mediterranean, Italian officials said.

The rescue vessels, including from Italy’s coast guard and navy, and three cargo ships saved 941 people in seven separate operations that began on Tuesday, Italy’s coast guard said.

The survivors were being ferried to southern Italian ports. The migrants had been aboard five motorised dinghies and two larger vessels. One of the larger boats capsized, and 10 bodies were spotted or plucked from the sea.

For months now, hundreds and sometimes thousands of migrants fleeing conflicts or poverty have been reaching Italy practically weekly on smugglers’ boats setting sail from bases in Libya.

Rescued migrants wait to disembark from an Italian Coast Guard vessel in Porto Empedocle, Sicily, southern Italy. Image by (AP Photo/Francesco Malavolta)

This year’s pace has seen a sharp rise from 2014’s already staggering count of 170,000 migrants and asylum seekers rescued at sea by Italy’s coast guard, navy and other vessels, including cargo boats pressed into humanitarian service.

According to interior ministry figures, 7,882 migrants arrived on Italian coasts in the first two months of this year, compared with 5,506 in that period in 2014.

The coast guard said the migrants saved in the latest rescues claimed to be Syrians, Palestinians, Libyans, Tunisians or from sub-Saharan Africa.

More than 30 children were among those rescued, and one of the 50 pregnant women aboard was urgently evacuated for medical reasons by a coast guard motorboat based at the tiny Italian island of Lampedusa.

(Press Association)