The incidents bring the total number of people who have died attempting to reach Europe this year to nearly 1 000.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Reacting to the latest figures on Tuesday, IOM Director General Amy Pope urged governments to intensify efforts to dismantle criminal trafficking and smuggling networks, while expanding safe and regular migration routes. \u201cEvery death at sea is preventable,\u201d Pope said, stressing that vulnerable people continue to be exploited and forced into perilous journeys due to a lack of lawful alternatives.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
In the most serious incident reported, more than 80 migrants went missing on Sunday when a boat capsized in the Central Mediterranean after departing from Tajoura in Libya. The vessel is believed to have been carrying about 120 people.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Earlier, on April 1, authorities recovered the bodies of 19 migrants aboard a drifting boat off southern Italy near the island of Lampedusa. Rescue teams believe the vessel had been adrift at sea for more than three days before help arrived.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The Central Mediterranean remains the world\u2019s deadliest migration route, where overcrowded, unseaworthy boats are frequently launched from North Africa by smuggling networks operating with near impunity. The IOM says many of those attempting the crossing are fleeing conflict, persecution, poverty and climate shocks, while others are driven by a lack of legal migration pathways.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
–UN\/ChannelAfrica–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":31138,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[78,26],"class_list":["post-31137","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-featured","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"More than 180 migrants and refugees are feared dead or missing following a series of shipwrecks in the Mediterranean Sea, according to the International Organisation for Migration (IOM).\u00a0","published_date":"","news_description":"More than 180 migrants and refugees are feared dead or missing following a series of shipwrecks in the Mediterranean Sea, according to the International Organisation for Migration (IOM).\u00a0","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/31137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/31137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31139,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/31137\/revisions\/31139"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=31137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}