A boat has capsized off Yemen's coast, leaving 68 African migrants dead and 74 others missing.
Sunday's tragedy, August 3, was the latest in a series of shipwrecks off Yemen that have killed hundreds of people fleeing conflict and poverty in hopes of reaching the wealthy Gulf Arab countries.
Abdusattor Esoev, the head of the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) in Yemen, shared that the vessel, with 154 Ethiopian migrants onboard, sank in the Gulf of Aden off the southern Yemeni province of Abyan early on Sunday.
Following the devastating incident, 54 bodies washed ashore in the district of Khanfar, and 14 others were found dead and taken to a hospital mortuary in Zinjibar, the provincial capital of Abyan on Yemen's southern coast.
Only 12 survived the shipwreck, and the rest were missing and presumed dead, Esoev said.
In a statement, the Abyan security directorate described a huge search-and-rescue operation given the large number of dead and missing migrants.
Despite more than a decade of civil war, Yemen is a major route for people from East Africa and the Horn of Africa trying to reach the Gulf Arab countries for work.
Migrants are taken by smugglers on often dangerous, overcrowded boats across the Red Sea or Gulf of Aden.
Hundreds of people have died or gone missing in shipwrecks off Yemen in recent months, including in March, when two migrants died and 186 others went missing after four boats capsized off Yemen and Djibouti.
