Death toll in Italy migrant shipwreck hits 34

Italy’s coastguard said Friday it had found another 14 bodies after a migrant shipwreck off the southern coast earlier this week, taking the confirmed death toll to 34.

More than 60 people had been reported missing after the sailing boat sank off the coast of Calabria overnight Sunday-Monday, with 11 people rescued.

“Today 14 bodies were recovered.. a total of 34 bodies have been recovered,” the coastguard said in a statement.

It said air and sea searches continued for the missing.

The coastguard had on Thursday reported another 12 bodies had been found, including women and children.

Medical charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said earlier this week that survivors had reported 66 people missing, including at least 26 children.

They had set off from Turkey and sank around 120 nautical miles off the coast of Calabria. Afghan families were among the missing, MSF said.

Ten bodies were found in a separate shipwrecked migrant boat on Monday off the Italian island of Lampedusa, according to German aid group ResQship.

Some 3,155 migrants died or disappeared in the Mediterranean last year, according to the UN’s International Organization for Migration.

More than 1,000 have died or are missing so far this year.

The Central Mediterranean — the area between North Africa and Italy and Malta — is the deadliest known migration route in the world, accounting for 80 percent of the deaths and disappearances in the Mediterranean.

Many migrants set off by boat from Tunisia or Libya, with Italy often their first port of call.

Arrivals have dropped considerably this year, with almost 24,500 people landing in Italy so far, compared to more than 58,600 in the same period in 2023, according to the interior ministry.