Open Arms rescues another 30 migrants in Mediterranean, now carrying 492
Rome, Sep 19 (EFE).- Spanish NGO Open Arms said that on Monday morning it rescued 30 migrants aboard a wooden barge in the central Mediterranean, taking the total number of migrants it has rescued to 402.
“Last night we rescued 30 people on board a very precarious vessel in international waters,” the organization said on Twitter.
“(There are) 402 people aboard Open Arms Uno and the body of one who did not make it,” it added.
In an earlier tweet, the nonprofit reported that it had rescued 294 people on Sunday, including 43 women and 60 children, who had been at sea for five days.
Most of them had “obvious symptoms of dehydration,” it said.
A few hours earlier, the Open Arms boat had rescued another 59 people, including six children, who had abandoned their vessel and taken refuge on an oil rig.
Among them was a corpse, added the NGO, which requested the urgent evacuation of some people due to medical problems.
On Friday, the Open Arms Uno had rescued another boat with 19 people on board.
Another nonprofit, SOS Humanity, which has 415 migrants aboard, is awaiting approval from Italy to access its ports.
In a press release on Friday, the search and rescue organization called “in urgency for a place of safety for their disembarkation.”
“After four rescues in seven days, there are 415 survivors on board the rescue ship Humanity 1, almost half of them are minors. Their health condition is increasingly deteriorating,” it said.
On Saturday, the Sea Watch 3 ship of the German NGO of the same name arrived at the port of Reggio Calabria with 428 migrants, after a state of necessity was declared the day before due to the situation on board.
About 66,323 migrants have arrived on Italian shores this year, compared to 43,043 in the same period of 2021, according to the interior ministry’s data. EFE
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