The Ocean Viking, an ambulance ship chartered by SOS Méditerranée, rescued 95 migrants aboard an “overloaded tire” boat off Libya on Wednesday, the humanitarian NGO announced, which fears at least four are missing.
According to survivors, at least four people fell into the water before this rescue operation, triggered by an alert from a patrol plane from the German humanitarian NGO Sea-Watch. The SOS Méditerranée teams searched for them for hours, to no avail.
More than 1000 deaths in 2022
The Marseille-based NGO regrets that the “two Libyan patrol boats in the area (have) left without responding to (their) requests for support in the search for missing persons.”
“The Libyan coast guard arrived at the scene during the operation and endangered the safety of the teams and the survivors by carrying out dangerous maneuvers,” SOS Méditerranée also denounced.
The central Mediterranean is the world’s most dangerous migration route, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM). The UN agency estimates that in 2022 1,377 migrants disappeared there.
Source: BFM TV
