Italy arrests two over immigrant tragedy

Italian police have arrested the two crew of a rickety ship smuggling illegal African immigrants after 28 of those aboard died of cold and dehydration while trying to reach Italy, officials said yesterday.

One of the immigrants was airlifted to St Luke's Hospital by an Italo-Maltese joint crewed Italian military helicopter.

A merchant ship from Gibraltar plucked 75 African immigrants, many of them barely conscious, to safety on Sunday. They had been drifting in a 14-metre wooden boat 75 miles off the coast of Sicily with little food or water.

The two men arrested were Liberians suspected of helping organise the trip and profiting from it, police said yesterday, adding that all of the details about the voyage and those responsible had been provided by the survivors.

The survivors said some 100 people had been in the boat when it left Libya nine days before but more than a quarter of those died on the way and their bodies were thrown overboard.

They said they were from Sudan, Liberia, the Ivory Coast and Sierra Leone and had paid $800-$1,800 for their passage.

Small boats carrying illegal migrants regularly make their way between North Africa and Italy, with many of those on board aiming to continue on to other countries in Europe in search of a better life.

Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu said on Sunday that the latest deaths reiterated the need for more international cooperation to help distinguish between genuine and illegal migrants, and criminal organisations also using the channels.

He added that a ministry representative would be sent to Tripoli shortly to discuss the situation.