(AKI) - A people smuggler's boat with 45 illegal immigrants on board reached the southern Italian island of Lampedusa early on Monday, continuing the wave of summer landings. Initial reports did not state the nationality or sex of the illegal migrants, who were identified and escorted by the coastguard to Lampedusa's temporary holding centre.| Lutherans? Transgendered Esquimaux? |
Last Friday, 19 illegal immigrants from Iran and Iraq were intercepted by border police and taken to the southern port of Bari on the Italian mainland.
As many as 71 African migrants aboard a single boat died in the Mediterranean Sea between Sicily and Malta last month, according to eight of their companions who were rescued by a fishing vessel last Wednesday. Most of the survivors were reported to be Sudanese. The people smugglers' boat set sail from Zuwara on the Libyan coast 10 days ago, but ran out of food and water and lost its engine in rough seas before sinking. Some of those aboard died of exhaustion, hunger and dehydration and others threw themselves overboard, survivors said.
The other victims, including a small child and four pregnant women drowned, according to the surviving passengers.