Hundreds feared dead after refugee boat capsizes off Tunisia

[News_Editor]

Hundreds feared dead after refugee boat capsizes off Tunisia

2011-06-02 20:01:52 GMT+7 (ICT)

TUNIS (BNO NEWS) -- More than 200 people are feared to have been killed after a refugee boat carrying more than 800 people broke down off a Tunisian island, state-run media reported on Thursday.

The state-run TAP news agency said Tunisian authorities received a distress call on Tuesday after a fishing boat had broken down, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) off the Kerkennah Islands, a group of islands lying off the east coast of Tunisia in the Gulf of Gabes.

The overloaded boat was coming from Libya and was carrying as many as 840 people, most of them from Africa but some were also from Asia. TAP said the refugees were illegally attempting to reach Italy.

As a result of bad weather conditions in the area, Tunisian Coast Guard and Army vessels were not able to begin an evacuation until Wednesday morning. Instead, Tunisian authorities were able to provide the refugees with food and blankets on Tuesday.

Lieutenant Colonel Tahar Landoulsi, Head of the Coast Guard office in Sfax, told TAP that the evacuation of the vessel was a difficult process because of the large number of passengers. He said priority had been given to children, but many people fell overboard when people desperately tried to leave the vessel.

On Thursday, TAP reported that approximately 570 people had been safely evacuated from the stranded vessel. Between 200 and 270 others were not accounted for, it said, adding that they likely drowned when they fell or were accidentally pushed overboard.

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