At least 25 people died at sea between the Comoros archipelago and the French island of Mayotte after their boat sank on the night of Friday November 1 to Saturday November 2, the International Organization for Migration announced on Monday ( IOM) in the East and the Horn of Africa. She claims that the boat was scuttled by traffickers (Photo: AFP)
“IOM Comoros is saddened to learn of the death of at least 25 people after the deliberate sinking of their boat caused by traffickers off the coast of the Comoros Islands, between Anjouan and Mayotte,” said the UN agency. in a press release.
The boat was carrying around thirty people, including seven women, two children aged six and two, as well as two infants, according to the account of five survivors rescued by fishermen on Saturday morning.
This arm of the sea separating the Comoros archipelago from Mayotte, which became a French department in 2011, is a particularly deadly migratory route.
Already in September, a boat carrying twelve people on board had never reached Mayotte after having set sail from Anjouan, in this area where the Comoros and the French department are only 70 kilometers apart. In August, eight people died in similar circumstances.
The arm of the sea separating the Comoros archipelago from Mayotte, which became a French department in 2011, is a particularly deadly migratory route. A year after the incorporation of Mayotte among the French departments, a senatorial report estimated that over the period from 1995 to 2012, between 7,000 and 12,000 people had died or disappeared in an attempted crossing.
Nearly half of the population of Mayotte was foreign, according to the latest figures from the French national statistics institute, in 2017. Among these 123,000 people, 95% were Comorian.
AFP
News from Mayotte, France, AFP, Migrants
