Eight dead as migrants forced off boat near Djibouti: IOM

ADDIS ABABA: At least eight people died and 22 were missing after smugglers forced migrants to disembark from a boat in the Red Sea, the UN´s migration agency said on Wednesday.

The boat had around 150 passengers when it was stopped by the smugglers who were carrying them last Thursday, forcing them to disembark midway through their journey. “The passengers were left to swim for their lives in open water,” the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said in a statement. Each year, thousands of African migrants brave the “Eastern Route” across the Red Sea from Djibouti to Yemen in the hope of eventually reaching oil-rich Gulf countries.

Last year, the IOM recorded at least 558 deaths on the route, with 462 resulting from shipwrecks.