Tunisia’s navy has rescued 356 migrants, including a two-month-old baby girl, off the country’s southeastern coast near Ben Guerdane, the Red Crescent has said. Ammar Lamloum, a Red Crescent official, told the AFP news agency that the group of migrants, mainly Africans, had been trying to reach the Italian island of Lampedusa when they were rescued on Wednesday.
“They are now at the port in Ben Guerdane,” he said. Tunisian and Italian authorities have been at the forefront of rescue efforts for a flood of mainly African migrants fleeing Libya and bound for Europe on unseaworthy boats that run into trouble. Four of the rescued migrants, including a pregnant woman, were being treated in hospital, Lamloum said, adding 38 women and seven children had been on the boat.
He said the migrants, who as well as sub-Saharan Africans included some Syrians, Moroccans and Egyptians, had left Libya aboard the makeshift vessel, but it had broken down off the Tunisian coast.
“A lot of people who have been rescued and I have spoken to will be pleased that they were rescued and didn’t end up drowning like many others have done in the Mediterranean Sea,” said Al Jazeera’s Nazanine Moshiri, reporting from Tunis.
“But once that euphoria is over, they will realise that they are back where they started, back in Africa.”
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