8 migrants drown, 12 missing while trying to reach Djibouti
Monday October 5, 2020
JOHANNESBURG (AP) — The International Organization for Migration says at least eight migrants have drowned and 12 are missing after smugglers forced them off a boat near the Horn of Africa nation of Djibouti.
The IOM said some 2,000 migrants have arrived in Djibouti from Yemen in the past three weeks alone. And yet some migrants are still making the journey to the Gulf, it said.
"This tragedy is a wake-up call,” said IOM spokeswoman Yvonne Ndege, warning that further tragedies could occur as hundreds of migrants are leaving Yemen every day on the precarious voyage by boat across the Bab al-Mandeb strait.
In 2017, up to 50 migrants from Somalia and Ethiopia were "deliberately drowned” when asmuggler forced them into the seaoff Yemen’s coast. And in 2018, at least 30 migrants and refugeesdied when a boat capsizedoff Yemen, with survivors reporting gunfire.
8 migrants drown, 12 missing while trying to reach Djibouti
The remaining 14 migrants survived and are receiving medical care, a statement said. All were thought to be Ethiopian and making the passage to Djibouti from Yemen — a reversal of the usual migrant voyage to seek work in richer Gulf nations suc