At least 80 Afghan citizens among nearly 200 people died when their overcrowded wooden boat believed to be carrying refugees from other countries slammed into the rocks off the coast of Italy’s Calabria region.
The Italian rescue teams have found many dead bodies at the sea and many more bodies reportedly washed up on a tourist beach Steccato di Cutro.
A few people have been rescued and the survivors said there were nearly 170 people in the boat.
The boat set off last week from Izmir, Turkey with people from Afghanistan, Iran, Somali, Iraq and Pakistan on board but ended up in a tragic way.
Each paid $8,500 to reach EU
These people have paid nearly $8,500 each to the smuggler that has been identified. Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni sent a letter to European leaders demanding quick action to respond to the migration crisis, according to RAI state television.
“The point is, the more people who set off, the more people risk dying,” she said.
The bodies of the victims were being transported to a sports hall in nearby Crotone. Many Afghans were seen on the ground crying on the coffin of their loved ones. There are also around 20 children, including twins and a newborn baby who lost their lives in this tragedy.
Condolence message
The Taliban foreign ministry sent condolence messages regarding the loss of lives of Afghan nationals in the southern sea of Italy. “With great sadness, we learned that 80 Afghan refugees, including women and children, who were traveling from Turkey to Italy in a wooden boat, drowned and died in the southern sea of Italy,” the ministry said in a statement.
The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan prays for forgiveness for the martyrs and patience for the families and relatives of the victims, the statement.
The ministry also urged the Afghan citizens “to avoid going to foreign countries through irregular migration.”
The Taliban also called on the international body to help bring the dead bodies to Afghanistan. The Taliban called on charitable foundations in particular on the International Committee of the Red Cross to “fulfill duty in terms of obligation toward humanity in finding and transferring the bodies of Afghan nationals drowned in the southern sea of Italy.”
Afghans and Pakistanis still missing
Pakistan said its 16 citizens have survived the tragedy incident, but confirmed four more are missing. So far 80 people have been found alive after they managed to reach the shore after their boat sank.
Italian custom police said they have arrested one survivor on migrant trafficking charges.
Sergio Di Dato, from charity Médecins Sans Frontières said that some children have lost their whole family, and they are providing them with all the support they can.
A 16-year-old boy from Afghanistan lost his 28-year-old sister, who died on the beach next to him, BBC reported.
A 43-year-old man from Afghanistan survived with his 14-year-old son. However, his wife and his three other children, who were 13, nine, and five, did not make it, it added.
An Afghan woman was in tears while finding her husband’s dead body on the beach.
“This is yet another tragedy happening near our shores. It reminds us all that the Mediterranean is a giant mass grave, with tens of thousands of souls in it, and it continues to widen,” said Francesco Creazzo, from SOS Méditerranée, an non-governmental organization.
“There is no end in sight; in 2013, people said ‘never again’ to the little white coffins of Lampedusa, in 2015, they said ‘never again’ in front of the lifeless body of a two-year-old Syrian child on a beach,” BBC reporting quoting him.
“Now the words ‘never again’ are not even pronounced any more. We only hear ‘no more departures’, but unfortunately people keep venturing on this journey and they keep dying,” he added.
Action require to support refugees
Speaking at the UN’s Human Rights Council in Geneva, Secretary General Antonio Guterres called on countries to do more to help refugees and migrants, and called for safer travel routes and strengthened rescue operations.
Italian Prime Minister Meloni also expressed “deep sorrow” after the incident and blamed the deaths on people smugglers. She furthered that the government is committed to preventing departures in order to stop unfolding these tragedies.
The International Organization for Migration’s Missing Migrants Project labeled the Central Mediterranean route as the most deadly migration route, where at least 20,334 people have died since 2014.
