Six dead, 40 missing after migrant boat wrecks near Lampedusa, Italy

Six people have died, and 40 are missing following a migrant boat disaster in the Mediterranean, the United Nations said on March 19.

The vessel sank off the coast of Italian island Lampedusa, Caliber.Az reports via foreign media.

“Still too many dead in a new shipwreck in the Mediterranean,” UNHCR’s Italy representative Chiara Cardoletti wrote on X. She revealed that the inflatable dinghy had departed Tunisia on March 17 with 56 people on board.

“After a few hours of sailing, the dinghy began to deflate and take on water. Six bodies (were) recovered. Forty missing,” Cardoletti added.

Italy’s coast guard and financial police managed to rescue 10 people—six men and four women—near Lampione, a small rocky islet off Lampedusa.

Survivors said there had been 56 people on board when the boat left Tunisia, but only six bodies—all male—were retrieved from the sea.

Survivors recounted that some of the missing passengers had fallen overboard amid rough sea conditions, the AGI news agency reported. The migrants hailed from Ivory Coast, Mali, Gambia, and Cameroon.

Shortly after the rescue operation, a separate group of 40 migrants reached Lampedusa aboard metal boats from Sfax, Tunisia, according to the ANSA news agency.

On March 19 alone, five migrant landings were recorded on Lampedusa, totalling 213 arrivals. The island’s reception centre now accommodates 230 migrants.

According to Italy’s interior ministry, 8,743 migrants have arrived in Italy so far this year, a figure slightly higher than the same period in 2024.

By Khagan Isayev