By: LakshmiPS
The migrant rescue boat Alan Kurdi has saved another 44 people, including women and infants, in distress on the Mediterranean, its operator German charity Sea-Eye said on Tuesday.
Malta has agreed to take in those rescued and is sending a vessel to pick them up, the charity said in a statement.
“Forty-four people, including four women and three children,” were brought aboard the Alan Kurdi, Sea-Eye said.
The children are 15 months, three and five years old. The people come from Bangladesh, Syria, Libya, Pakistan and Guinea.
The Alan Kurdi last week rescued 65 shipwrecked migrants making the perilous journey from North Africa and handed them over to Malta after Italy closed its ports to the vessel.
Sea-Eye said it was alerted to the latest migrants in distress off the Libyan coast by Tunisian fishermen and the Colibri civilian search plane.
The rescued migrants said they left Zuwara in Libya early Saturday.
The Maltese authorities asked a nearby freighter to coordinate the rescue, which told the Sea-Eye to take those in distress on board.
“We are incredibly happy that we could be in the right place again at the right time and that we now know 44 more people in safety. A 15-month-old baby should never have to be in such a life-threatening situation,” said Sea-Eye spokeswoman Carlotta Weibl.
(AFP)
