At least 42 people are presumed dead after a migrant boat capsized off the coast of Libya last week, the UN’s migration agency confirmed on Wednesday.
Seven survivors were located after the vessel’s engine failed in high waves around dawn on 3 November, hours after departing Zuwara, a coastal city in northwestern Libya, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) stated.
The survivors were stranded for six days, eventually found by Libyan authorities during a rescue mission near the al-Buri Oil Field on Saturday.
The rubber boat was reportedly carrying 47 men and two women. The missing comprise 29 Sudanese, eight Somalis, three Cameroonian nationals, and two individuals from Nigeria.
The IOM said it has provided urgent medical care, water and food to the survivors, who have been taken to Tripoli where they are said to be in a stable condition after suffering sunburn and skin irritation from seawater.
Libya has been a main transit point for migrants fleeing war and poverty in Africa and the Middle East. The country has plunged into chaos following a NATO-backed uprising that toppled and killed longtime autocrat Moammar Gadhafi in 2011.
Last month, a migrant wooden boat that departed al-Zawiya in northwestern Libya capsized due to high waves, with the loss of 18 people, according to IOM. Another 64 people from Sudan, Bangladesh and Pakistan survived.
The latest shipwreck adds to the rising death toll in the Central Mediterranean, where more than 1,000 people have died since the beginning of 2025, including over 500 lost off the coast of Libya, according to the IOM’s Missing Migrants Project.
