Tunisian Mohammed Ali Malek, 27, centre, charged with the death of 800 migrants, appeared in a Catania court yesterday for his first sitting. Mr Malek was the captain of a boat carrying migrants from Libya to Europe last year. He is accused of causing a collision with a Portuguese merchant ship. Only 28 migrants survived, while just 24 bodies were recovered and buried in Malta. Mr Malek appears here in a file photo with survivors aboard an Italian coastguard ship that docked in Malta with the dead migrants. He and fellow trafficker Syrian Mahmud Bikhit had tried to disguise themselves among the survivors.

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