Tragedy at sea: A man on a boat holds the body of a child killed at sea. Photo / AP
Tragedy at sea: A man on a boat holds the body of a child killed at sea. Photo / AP
A picture of a young boy who drowned off of the coast of the Greek island of Rhodes has come to represent the tragedy in the Mediterranean sea.
He was one of three migrants who died this morning after a boat carrying dozens of people ran aground.
On the other side of the sea, a survivor of Saturday's disaster has said there were as many as 950 people aboard the boat that capsized - most are suspected to have died.
So far 28 survivors have been rescued following the tragedy near the Italian island of Lampedusa, and many of them have offered different accounts as to how many others were on board.
One of the rescued, a 32-year old man from Bangladesh, told Italian prosecutors there were 950, a number far larger than the 700 figure widely reported.
The man said about 300 people had been locked in the hold by smugglers when the boat set out. He said that aboard the vessel were 200 women and several dozen children.
"They died like rats in a cage," he's quoted as saying by La Sicilia.
Both prosecutor Giovanni Salvi and Italian Premier Matteo Renzi stressed that they have not yet verified details of the tragedy.
Eighteen ships are searching for survivors, but only 28 were rescued and 24 bodies pulled from the water by Sunday night.
These small numbers make sense if, as some survivors have indicated, hundreds of people had been locked in the hold - because with so much weight down below, "surely the boat would have sunk," explained General Antonino Iraso of the Italian Border Police.
A rescuer cradles a child in the Sicilian harbor of Pozzallo, Italy where about 100 migrants, including 28 children, were rescued. Photo / AP
Iraso said the sea in the area - which runs as deep as 3 miles - is too deep for divers, and suggested that the final toll may never be known.
"How can it be that we daily are witnessing a tragedy?" asked Renzi, who strategised with top ministers ahead of today's EU meeting in Luxembourg.
So far this year, 35,000 asylum seekers and migrants have reached Europe and more than 900 are known to have died trying.
With the weekend's tragedy, demands for action have been voiced across the European continent, with authorities from France, Spain, Germany and Britain issuing calls for a unified response.
"Europe can do more and Europe must do more," said Martin Schulz, president of the European Parliament. "It is a shame and a confession of failure how many countries run away from responsibility and how little money we provide for rescue missions."
Europe must mobilize "more ships, more overflights by aircraft," French President Francois Hollande told French TV Canal+ on Sunday.
"Words won't do anymore," said Spain's Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy.
Renzi said he too wants action, but rejected calls by some Italian lawmakers for a naval blockade. That would only "wind up helping the smugglers" since military ships would be there to rescue any migrants, and they wouldn't be able to return passengers to chaos and violence in Libya.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the latest tragedy is an urgent reminder "of the critical need for a robust search and rescue capacity in the Mediterranean". He called the Mediterranean "the world's deadliest route used by asylum seekers and migrants."
A migrant is helped disembark in the Sicilian harbor of Pozzallo, Italy. Photo / AP
Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, whose island nation has joined the rescue effort, has said only 50 have survived, and called it the "biggest human tragedy of the last few years".
It's thought that the 66-foot vessel overturned because migrants rushed to one side of late Saturday night when they saw an approaching ship - the Portuguese-flagged container 'the King Jacob'.
The ship's crew "immediately deployed rescue boats, gangway, nets and life rings," a spokesman for its owner said.
Asked whether migrants rushed to one side as the Portuguese vessel pulled close, Iraso said "the dynamics aren't clear. But this is not the first time that has happened".
Renzi praised the container ship for quickly responding on what would become its fifth recent rescue operation, as it is sometimes called upon by the Italian Coast Guard.
"Since the waters of the Mediterranean Sea are not too cold at the moment, authorities hope to find more survivors," said International Organization for Migration spokesman Joel Millman.
"There are fears there could be hundreds of dead," Pope Francis said in St. Peter's Square, lending his moral authority to the political calls for action by urging "the international community to act decisively and promptly, to prevent similar tragedies from occurring again."
Desperate migrants fleeing war, persecution and conflict in Africa, the Middle East and Asia have long tried to reach Europe.
Migrants wait to disembark in the Sicilian harbor of Pozzallo, Italy. Photo / AP
Libya, in particular, is a frequent point of departure in recent years - since rival militias, tribal factions and other political forces destabilized the country after Gaddafi was overthrown.
Malta and Italy are closest to the Libyan coast, and have received the brunt of a migrant tide that carried 219,000 people from Africa to Europe last year.
