IRISH EXAMINER
Rescue teams have pulled another body from the sea, bringing the death toll from Italy’s latest migration tragedy to 64, as prosecutors identified smugglers who allegedly charged €8,000 each for the “voyage of death” from Turkey.
Premier Giorgia Meloni sent a letter to European leaders demanding quick action to respond to the migration crisis, insisting the only way to deal with it seriously and humanely is to stop migrants from risking their lives on dangerous sea crossings.
“The point is, the more people who set off, the more people risk dying,” she told RAI state television.
At least 64 people, including eight children, died when their overcrowded wooden boat slammed into sandbanks just a few hundred metres off Italy’s Calabrian coast and broke apart in rough seas early on Sunday.
Eighty people survived but dozens more are feared dead since survivors indicated the boat had carried about 170 people when it set off last week from Izmir.
Aid groups at the scene said many of the passengers came from Afghanistan, including entire families, as well as from Pakistan, Syria and Iraq.
Rescue teams pulled one body from the sea on Tuesday morning, bringing the death toll to 64, said Andrea Mortato, of the firefighter divers unit.
Crotone prosecutor Giuseppe Capoccia confirmed investigators had identified three suspected smugglers, a Turk and two Pakistani nationals. A second Turk is believed to have escaped or died in the wreck.
Italy’s customs police said that crossing organizers charged 8,000 euros each for the “voyage of death”.
Interior minister Matteo Piantedosi pushed back strongly at suggestions that the rescue was delayed or affected by government policy discouraging aid groups from staying at sea to rescue migrants.
