including a child after their Europe-bound boat sank off the North African country's coast. No fewer than 57 bodies including from Pakistan have died after their boat sank in the Mediterranean shores in western Libya. The Voice of America reported that about 80 passengers boarded the boat which was off for Europe at around 2:00 am on Tuesday. The victims were migrants from Pakistan, Syria, Tunisia, and Egypt.

One survivor, Bassam Mahmoud from Egypt, recounted that an argument had ensued as the boat was sinking but the man in charge refused to stop. “We kept fighting until someone caught up with us. The scene was horrific and some died in the water in front of me.” A coast guard named Fathi al-Zayani said several bodies, including that of a child, were recovered off Qarabulli in eastern Tripoli.

A Red Crescent aid worker in western Tripoli also disclosed that they had recovered 46 bodies in the past six days from the beach and they were all “illegal migrants” from one boat. The aid worker whose identity was not disclosed noted that more bodies were expected to be washed up in the coming days. The coastguard also came to the aid of at least four survivors of the shipwreck who were able to swim to shore after the sinking.

It is the latest migrant tragedy off North Africa, after a migrant boat sinking last week west of Tripoli killed at least 34 people. Authorities in the town of Garabulli, about 50 kilometres east of Tripoli, were alerted to the presence of bodies floating in the water a few metres from the shore. They recovered the corpses of 10 men and a girl and placed them in white body bags, and rescued the survivors who were too exhausted to flee on foot.

Lying on grass, the survivors tried to catch their breath and regain strength after receiving food and drink from the rescuers. One of the migrants said the boat had carried about 80 people before it went down near the coastline. Some fled the area after swimming back to shore, but the fate of other migrants was not immediately clear. Those on board the stricken vessel were of various nationalities, including Bangladesh, Egypt and Pakistan, according to passports shown by the survivors.

In the evening, the coastguard carried out a second mission to rescue migrants on board another boat in distress off the same city. "We rescued 61 migrants who were on another boat and they are all safe... they are from Syria, Pakistan, Bangladesh and African countries," an official of the Garabulli coastguard told reporters. More than a decade of violence in Libya since the fall and killing of dictator Moamer Kadhafi in 2011 helped turn the country into a fertile ground for human traffickers who have been accused of abuses ranging from extortion to slavery.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan-INP