A boat carrying migrants capsized off the Libyan coast on Tuesday, with Libyan authorities reporting one person dead and 22 missing. This tragedy is the latest in a series involving migrants seeking a better life in Europe.
The coast guard in Tobruk, a town in eastern Libya, revealed that the boat, which was carrying 32 migrants, had suffered a mechanical failure. Nine survivors have been rescued and taken to a port in Tobruk.
The boat departed from Bab al-Zaitoun, located 15 kilometres (9 miles) east of Tobruk, according to the local aid group Abreen. The group, which supports migrants in eastern Libya, stated that the vessel capsized after its engine broke down.
The migrants were identified as being from Egypt and Syria. The nine survivors have been taken to a hospital.
Libya has become a major transit point for migrants fleeing conflict and poverty from Africa and the Middle East in recent years. In December, at least 61 migrants, including women and children, drowned off Libya’s western coast near Zuwara.
Since the 2011 NATO-backed uprising that toppled and killed longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi, Libya has been in turmoil. The ensuing chaos has enabled human traffickers to exploit the situation, smuggling migrants across Libya’s borders on poorly equipped vessels.
According to the Missing Migrants Project run by the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), at least 434 migrants have been reported dead and 611 missing off Libya in the past eight months. Over 14,100 migrants were intercepted and sent back to Libya during this period.
Last year, the IOM recorded 962 migrant deaths and 1,563 missing persons off Libya, with around 17,200 migrants being intercepted and returned to the country.
Those who are intercepted face dire conditions in government-run detention centres, where they endure abuses such as forced labour, beatings, rape, and torture. These practices have been condemned as crimes against humanity by U.N. investigators. In many cases, families are coerced into paying extortion money before their loved ones are released from detention and put on traffickers’ boats bound for Europe.