A UN official has
blamed Italy’s strict policies toward irregular migrants for the death
of at least 93 people in a boat incident in the country.
"Treating irregular migrants only by repressive measures would create these tragedies," said Francois Crepeau, the United Nations special rapporteur on the human rights of migrants, on Thursday, adding, "Irregular immigration is not a crime against persons or property or security... 99.99 percent of irregular migrants pose no threat to security."
His comments came after a boat carrying some 500 people caught fire and capsized near the Italian island of Lampedusa.
"These deaths did not need to happen," he said, adding that the “criminalization of irregular immigration" had played a role in the incident.
After the incident, Giusi Nicolini, the local mayor of Lampedusa, said that emergency workers found 93 bodies, including those of two children and several women.
“The survivors are in a state of shock. They have been in the water since the early hours of the morning,” Nicolini said.
A total of 151 people have been rescued so far.
The asylum-seekers said they were from Eritrea and Somalia. The vessel is believed to have left from Libyan shores.
Lampedusa is an Italian island that lies between Tunisia and Sicily and is a main entrance for asylum-seekers to the European Union.
The fatal accident is the latest in a string of drowning incidents involving migrants traveling on wobbly fishing boats or rubber dinghies in the Mediterranean.
On September 30, more than 10 Eritrean asylum-seekers died as they desperately tried to reach the shore when their boat went aground off Sicily near the city of Ragusa.
In August, six Egyptian men lost their lives in a similar incident near Catania in another part of Sicily.
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