Two babies are among the at least 53 people dead or missing after an inflatable boat carrying migrants sank off the coast of Libya, the UN migration agency said Monday, the latest tragedy on a dangerous route for those seeking a better life in Europe.
The UN’s International Organization for Migration (IOM) reported in a statement that the boat with 55 African migrants on board departed from the city of Zawaiya, in western Libya, shortly before midnight on Thursday. About six hours later, it began to take on water and capsized on Friday morning north of the city of Zuwara, according to the agency.
Two Nigerian women survived the shipwreck and were rescued by the Libyan authorities, according to IOM. One of them said she lost her husband, while the other reported having lost her two babies.
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“Trafficking and smuggling networks continue to exploit migrants along the central Mediterranean route,” the UN agency stated. These networks profit by using precarious vessels to transport migrants from chaotic Libya to European coasts, it added.
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In recent years, Libya has become the main transit point for migrants fleeing war and poverty in Africa and the Middle East, even though the North African nation has been plunged into chaos following a NATO-backed uprising that overthrew and killed long-time autocrat Muammar Gadhafi in 2011.
The number of migrants reported dead or missing in 2026 on the central Mediterranean route currently amounts to 484, according to the IOM’s Missing Migrants Project. Last year, more than 1,300 migrants died or went missing on that route, it indicated.
“These repeated incidents highlight the persistent and deadly risks faced by migrants and refugees attempting to make the dangerous journey,” he added.
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In recent years, human traffickers have profited from the chaos in Libya, illegally introducing migrants through the country’s extensive borders, which it shares with six nations. Migrants are often forced to navigate overcrowded and poorly equipped vessels, including rubber boats.
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Those who are intercepted and returned to Libya are held in detention centers run by the government, plagued by abuses, including forced labor, beatings, rape and torture, practices that constitute crimes against humanity, according to investigators commissioned by the UN.
Abuses often accompany efforts to extort the families of detainees, before migrants are allowed to leave Libya on traffickers’ boats.
