A Boat With 50 Migrants Near Malta Calls for Urgent Rescue

On Friday, a drifting boat carrying around 50 migrants onboard urgently required a rescue from the Maltese or Italian authorities due to the critical situation it was facing. The boat has lost all its engines and has begun to experience water leaks.

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The group, which departed from Libya a few days ago with the intention of reaching European soil, is "in distress and desperate, awaiting rescue as water continues to enter the boat," alerted Alarm Phone, an NGO that receives calls from migrants in danger at sea.

This humanitarian organization urged Italian and Maltese authorities to carry out a "quick rescue with a safe destination" and pleaded not to let the migrants die at sea.

"We have just been contacted by the 50 people in distress. They are desperate and still waiting for rescue. Water is entering the boat. The situation is critical. We urge all relevant authorities: Don't let them drown!," Alarm Phone stressed.

Five hours earlier, the NGO had raised an alert about the boat's situation: "The boat is adrift. The fishing boat Alba Chiara is nearby, but we haven't been able to communicate directly. We have asked the Libyan authorities to relay the SOS, but they claim to be on vacation on Friday."

Currently, Italy is under a "state of national migratory emergency", which is a legal figure that allows its authorities to allocate resources for the transfer of migrants and for rapid repatriations without having to go through parliamentary approval.

The emergency state was implemented due to the increasing number of migrants arriving in Italian territory, which could become an exponential flow during the summer. So far this year, the authorities have registered over 60,000 arrivals, a figure higher than the one registered in the first half of 2022.