Migrant crisis: Europol to investigate mass drowning

The European policing agency Europol is planning to investigate what is believed to be the biggest loss of a migrant boat in 2016, following a Reuters-BBC Newsnight investigation. More than 500 people are thought to have died in the sinking on 9 April, but there has been no official inquiry. Newsnight has established that the […]

The European policing agency Europol is planning to investigate what is believed to be the biggest loss of a migrant boat in 2016, following a Reuters-BBC Newsnight investigation.

More than 500 people are thought to have died in the sinking on 9 April, but there has been no official inquiry.

Newsnight has established that the boat set sail from Egypt – not Libya, as the UNHCR stated at the time.

The head of Europol, Rob Wainwright, said the case was “uncomfortable”.

He welcomed the Reuters-BBC Newsnight investigation and promised “to look at it again” given “the absence of any clear answers”.

Thirty-seven people survived the shipwreck, but more than 500 are believed to have died. Those who perished came from Somalia, Ethiopia, Sudan, Syria, Egypt and a number of other countries.

Each had paid around $2,000 (£1,600) to smugglers in the hope of reaching Italy.