Daily Times

Five Pakistani citizens are reported to have died in a boat wreck off the coast of Benghazi in Libya, the Foreign Office said on Tuesday.

“We would like to share with great sorrow that initial reports suggest that four Pakistanis have perished in a boat wreck near Benghazi, Libya on 26 February 2023,” the Foreign Office said in a tweet.

Pakistan’s embassy in Tripoli is facilitating the process of transportation of the mortal remains of the victims to Pakistan, it added.

The latest incident comes after 62 people died when a wooden sailboat carrying migrants from several countries, including Pakistan, crashed against the rocks off southern Italian coast early on Sunday.

The Foreign Office confirmed that 20 Pakistanis were on board the ill-fated boat-16 of whom survived while four were still missing. The vessel, which was believed to be carrying betwwen 180 to 200 migrants, had set sail from Izmir in western Turkey three or four days earlier, Manuela Curra, the provincial government official in Italy’s southern Calabria region, said.

On Tuesday, Italian authorities said they have arrested three people who they believe were involved in trafficking the migrants on the ill-fated vessel.

Lieutenant Colonel Alberto Lippolis told Reuters hat a Turkish man and two Pakistani nationals had sailed the boat from Turkey to Italy despite the terrible weather, and were identified by survivors as “the main culprits of the tragedy”.

“According to initial investigations, they allegedly asked the migrants for about 8,000 euros ($8,485) each for the deadly journey,” said Lippolis, commander of a finance police team in the region of Calabria. “All three have been arrested.”

One of the Pakistanis was a minor, a judicial source said, adding that police were looking for a fourth suspect, who is Turkish.

On February 15, at least 73 migrants were reported missing and presumed dead following a shipwreck off the Libyan coast, according to the International Organisation for Migration IOM in Libya said.

Seven survivors made it to shore from the boat, which was carrying around 80 people who had reportedly departed from Qasr Alkayar, east of Tripoli, to head to Europe, the IOM added.