Boat carrying migrants from Madagascar sinks; 34 drown

Officials in Madagascar have recovered 34 our bodies from the Indian Ocean after the sinking of a ship that was carrying migrants hoping to get to Mayotte.

The boat carrying 58 passengers sailed clandestinely with out going via official immigration or customs controls and sank late Saturday night time off the northwest coast of Madagascar, in accordance with Malagasy maritime authorities. Customs and Navy patrol boats recovered the our bodies close to the island of Nosy Faly, Director General of the Port, Maritime and Fluvial Agency Jean Edmond Randrianantenaina mentioned. The victims primarily come from Ambilobe and in addition Tamatave, Majunga and Nosy Be, in accordance with preliminary investigations, he mentioned. “The whole state equipment is offended at this tragedy. Also, we’re implementing all attainable means to hurry up the investigations,” Randrianantenaina mentioned. On the night time of the sinking native fishermen in canoes rescued 24 survivors, he mentioned. All however one of many survivors “fled as quickly as they arrived on the financial institution, earlier than the arrival of the authorities, little doubt for concern of being arrested,” mentioned Lt. Col. Jules Tovoson Andriatsiriniaina, commander of the Diana area gendarmerie group. “Only a younger girl, pregnant, was discovered,” he mentioned. She was handled at Ambilobe hospital and is being interviewed as a key witness, he mentioned.

Officials are in search of two individuals, a person and a lady, suspected of being the smugglers or accomplices in illegally transporting migrants. They are needed for “unlawful boarding and clandestine transport, involuntary murder of passengers to Mayotte,” he mentioned.

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A ship that was carrying migrants from Madagascar sunk leaving 34 individuals to drown. (Fox News)

“It’s one more shipwreck,” mentioned Roger Charles Evina, consultant of the International Organization for Migration for Madagascar and the Comoros.

“Unfortunately, there are not any official nationwide statistics on these tragedies at sea. But we see that these are actually recurring departures, carried out clandestinely and the ultimate vacation spot may be very usually Mayotte,” he mentioned.

Although Mayotte is a poor archipelago of small islands, it’s a French territory which can make it a horny vacation spot for migrants from Madagascar. The IOM has been growing a program for a number of months to struggle in opposition to this unlawful immigration from Madagascar, he mentioned.

“One of the actions of our mission is to supply income-generating actions to potential migrants, in an effort to stabilize them within the communities of origin,” mentioned Evina. “Because we all know, for essentially the most half, that folks migrate for financial causes.”