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40 Somali migrants drown
21/02/2008 17:15 - (SA)
Sana'a - At least 40 Somali refuge-seekers have drowned after smugglers forced them into the sea as their two overcrowded boats approached Yemeni shores, Yemeni coastguard officials said on Thursday.
The officials said the bodies of 40 passengers including those of 17 women were washed ashore on Wednesday on Hawra village in the province of Shabwa province, around 580 kilometres south-east of Sana'a.
They told Deutsche Presse-Agentur-dpa that 176 people had made it to shore alive and were taken to a nearby refugee shelter, while locals buried the bodies of the victims in makeshift graves.
The exact number of passengers aboard the two boats was not known, said the officials. The incident occurred late on Tuesday.
Survivors told rescuer workers that smugglers, fearing capture by Yemeni coastguards, had forced passengers on the two boats to jump off at gunpoint as they neared the end of their three-day trip across the Gulf of Aden from Somalia to Yemen.
This was the latest in a series of similar tragic boat incidents in which hundreds of people are killed every year.
Since the beginning of 2008, at least 200 African illegal migrants have died or gone missing in boat accidents off Yemen.
Hundreds of Somali and Ethiopian migrants perish every year making the dangerous crossing of the Gulf of Aden to Yemen on small boats run by smugglers operating from Somali ports.
Last year, more than 113 000 people, mostly Somalis, made the perilous voyage to Yemen, with over 1 400 deaths.
Since the outbreak of civil war in Somalia, Yemen has become a magnet for refugees fleeing violence and drought and a gateway to the oil-rich countries of the Arabian peninsula and Europe.
Sapa-dpa
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