Crotone, Lampedusa register new wave of migrant arrivals

(ANSA) - ROME, NOV 5 - A new wave of migrants on Monday and Tuesday reached the Calabrian city of Crotone and the Sicilian island of Lampedusa, with the latter recording hundreds of arrivals.
    A reported 208 migrants rescued from four different boats reached Lampedusa in the night between Monday and Tuesday.
    Shortly before midnight, a coast guard vessel rescued a 10-meter-long boat with 141 people on board, including citizens of Bangladesh, Egypt, Eritrea, Libya, Morocco, Pakistan, Syria and Sudan.
    The passengers said they had departed from Zawiya, in Libya, paying between 5 and 7,000 dollars and that they intended to reach France, Germany and the Netherlands.
    EU border agency Frontex and finance police vessels also apprehended three boats carrying, respectively, 24, 26 and 17 migrants from Pakistan, Syria, Sudan, Ethiopia and Afghanistan.
    The first two groups were travelling on two dinghies that had departed from Ras Jedir, in Libya, while a third had departed from Tripoli.
    Landings resumed on Lampedusa on Monday, when 571 people reached the island on 12 boats over the course of 24 hours.
    Meanwhile 26 minors and 20 women were among the 99 people rescued in the night of Monday by coast guards and taken to the port of Crotone, in Calabria.
    They were on a 16-metre-long sailboat when they were intercepted 30 miles south of Crotone by port authorities.
    Most of the passengers, who had departed from Turkey four days before, hailed from Afghanistan.
    They included six minors travelling alone.
    There were also an Algerian woman and three Iranian men.
    The migrants, including four pregnant women, were in good health, according to healthcare officials from Crotone's local health authority.
    Only one Afghan citizen was hospitalized because he was seriously dehydrated.
    The migrants were taken to the hosting centre of Isola Capo Rizzuto. (ANSA).