The United Nations is investigating the sinking of an overcrowded boat within the Mediterranean in what may very well be one of many worst tragedies involving refugees and migrants since an estimated 800 individuals drowned in a shipwreck off the Libyan coast precisely one 12 months in the past.

The UN refugee company UNHCR stated Wednesday {that a} workforce has interviewed survivors of the wreck to be taught extra in regards to the extent of the catastrophe.

If confirmed, as many as 500 individuals might have misplaced their lives when the big boat went down within the Mediterranean Sea at an unknown location between Libya and Italy. The 41 survivors – 37 males, three girls and a three-year-old little one – had been rescued by a service provider ship and brought to Kalamata, within the Peloponnese peninsula of Greece on April 16. Those rescued embody 23 Somalis, 11 Ethiopians, 6 Egyptians and a Sudanese.

The survivors instructed UNHCR workers that that they had been a part of a gaggle of between 100 and 200 individuals who departed final week from close to Tobruk in Libya on a 30-meter-long boat.

“After several hours at sea, the smugglers in charge of the boat attempted to transfer the passengers to a larger ship carrying hundreds of people in terribly overcrowded conditions,” UNHCR stated in an announcement. “At one point during the transfer, the larger boat capsized and sank.”

The 41 survivors embody individuals who had not but boarded the bigger vessel, in addition to some who managed to swim again to the smaller boat. They drifted at sea presumably for 3 days earlier than being noticed and rescued on April 16.

UNHCR visited the survivors on the native stadium of Kalamata the place they’ve been briefly housed by the native authorities whereas they bear police procedures.

According to UNHCR, thus far this 12 months 179,552 refugees and migrants have reached Europe by sea throughout the Mediterranean and Aegean. At least 761 have died or gone lacking making an attempt the journey.