A boat carrying 77 asylum seekers has sunk, leaving at least 28 people missing, according to the United Nations Migration Agency.
At least 16 people have been killed and 28 are missing after a boat carrying asylum seekers capsized off the coast of Djibouti in the Horn of Africa, the United Nations migration agency said.
The incident comes about two weeks after another boat carrying mainly Ethiopian asylum seekers sank off the coast of Djibouti, killing dozens on the dangerous so-called “eastern migration route” from Africa to the Middle East. It happened later on Monday night.
“A tragedy occurred when a boat carrying 77 migrants, including children, capsized off the coast of Djibouti,” the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said in a post on X on Tuesday.
“At least 28 people are missing. 16 dead,” it said, adding that the local IOM branch was “assisting local authorities with search and rescue operations.”
Agency spokeswoman Yvonne Ndege told AFP news agency that the 16 dead included children and infants, but did not provide further details.
❗️ Tragedy of boat capsizing #Djibouti The beach carrying 77 migrants, including children. At least 28 people are missing. 16 people died. @Djibouti Assist local authorities with search and rescue operations. pic.twitter.com/s4L7ASNW4o
— IOM – United Nations Migration News (@UNMigrationNews) April 23, 2024
Berhanu Tsegae, Ethiopian Ambassador to Djibouti, said: Said X reported that the boat was carrying Ethiopians from Yemen and that the accident occurred off the coast of Godria, northeast of Djibouti.
He said 33 people survived, including one woman.
On April 8, another boat carrying more than 60 people sank off the coast of Godria, according to IOM and the Ethiopian embassy in Djibouti.
IOM said at the time that 38 bodies, including children, had been found and six more people were missing.
The Ethiopian embassy said the boat was carrying Ethiopians from Djibouti to war-torn Yemen.
“East Route”
Every year, tens of thousands of African asylum seekers brave the “Eastern Passage” across the Red Sea and through Yemen to reach Saudi Arabia, fleeing conflict and natural disasters or seeking better economic opportunities. There is.
“Many face life-threatening dangers during their journeys, including hunger, health risks and exploitation by human traffickers and other criminals,” IOM said in a February statement.
Ndege said IOM data for 2023 shows “an increase in the number of people attempting to cross.”
Ethiopians accounted for 79% of the approximately 100,000 people who arrived in Yemen last year from Djibouti or Somalia, with the remainder being Somalis, according to the IOM.
Ethiopia, Africa's second most populous country, has been ravaged by various conflicts and several regions have suffered from severe drought in recent years.
More than 15 percent of the country's 120 million residents rely on food aid.
IOM said in February that at least 698 people, including women and children, died crossing the Gulf of Aden from Djibouti to Yemen last year, according to the Missing Migrants Project.
