Tragedy: 32 rescued, 71 lost at sea after migrant boat sinks off Italy

Survivors said their ship had originally included 105 passengers, ‌with 71 lost at sea, said the rescue charities.

Tragedy: 32 rescued, 71 lost at sea after migrant boat sinks off Italy
Tragedy: 32 rescued, 71 lost at sea after migrant boat sinks off Italy

A migrant capsizes near Italy, and a dozen migrants on board were lost after the incident.

Two merchant vessels near the Italian coast recovered the bodies of two migrants and rescued 32 survivors from a boat trying ‌to cross to Europe from Libya on Easter weekend, rescue charities said, citing the survivors as saying 71 others were lost at sea.

The victims were transferred to an Italian coast guard patrol boat and brought to the Italian island of Lampedusa, said the groups Mediterranea Saving Humans and Sea-Watch.

Survivors said their ship had originally included 105 passengers, ‌with 71 lost at sea, said the rescue charities.

Video released from Sea-Watch showed about a dozen people clinging to a capsized orange boat as it was approached by the merchant vessel.

Bad weather has roiled the Mediterranean this year, limiting the number of departures from North Africa and posing grave problems for those who have managed to put to sea.

The International Organization for Migration IOM estimates that at least 683 have died in the central Mediterranean this year, one of the highest tolls since 2014.

The news comes days after 8 people died in a boat incident in Turkey when an inflatable vessel carrying migrants sank off Turkey's western ‌province of Mugla.