MIGRATION-ITALY/LIBYA (PHOTO) – REUTERS Agency
ROME, June 17 (Reuters) – Spanish charity Open Arms said it had rescued 117 migrants crammed into a precarious wooden boat from Libya on Saturday.
A shipwreck off the Greek coast last week, in which at least 78 of the hundreds of people traveling crowded on a fishing boat died, has once again highlighted the deaths of thousands of immigrants who flee poverty every year and conflicts in Africa and the Middle East.
Open Arms said in a statement that it had rescued 117 people on Saturday, including 25 women and a three-year-old child, mainly from Eritrea, Sudan and Libya.
The salvage operation took place in international waters, 30 km off the Libyan coast, after the vessel left Sabratha port in the dark at 0100 GMT, according to the statement and a spokesperson for the charity.
All the passengers were receiving a medical assessment on board the Open Arms ship, the charity said, without elaborating where they would be transferred. (Reporting by Giselda Vagnoni. Editing in Spanish by Javier Leira)
Source: Ambito
