More than 140 refugees drowned

A 16-year-old boy who survived a shipwreck in the Mediterranean in his own words, has declared Wednesday that almost all the people on board the boat with refugees when he was drowned.

He was with nearly 150 people boarded for the crossing of the Libyan Sabratha place to probably the Italian island of Lampedusa. The ship sank on Wednesday in the night of Tuesday.

The boy survived because he was clinging to a piece of wood wreck until he was found by a Spanish ship. He is so far the only survivor who was fished out of the water. Among the passengers there were, according to the boy at least five children and an unknown number of pregnant women. So far no victims found.

The story of the boy is confirmed by the Coast Guard on the island of Lampedusa where the boy was brought there by the Spaniards and the IOM, the International Organization for Migration. The IOM had this year so far 649 people have drowned during the crossing of the Mediterranean Sea. But it would, according to IOM President Flavio Di Giacomo can be much more, because many shipwrecks remain unnoticed.