The Italian navy has filmed the moment a migrant boat capsized in the Mediterranean, killing five people, as crews rescued 562 others. The trawler overturned after passengers rushed to one side upon spotting a rescue vessel, causing it to destabilise.
Footage shows people clinging to the deck or plunging into the sea. Italy's Bettica patrol boat deployed life rafts and life jackets, while another Italian ship sent rescue boats. Later on Wednesday, the same patrol boat rescued an additional 108 migrants in a separate incident.
Nearly 6,000 migrants attempting to reach Europe illegally have been rescued from unseaworthy boats in the Mediterranean in recent days. Aid agencies note that the Libya-Italy route has become the primary crossing since an EU-Turkey deal reduced Aegean Sea crossings to Greece.
Meanwhile, the Italian navy is conducting an unprecedented operation off the Libyan coast to recover the wreck of a migrant boat that sank in April last year, killing up to 700 people—the largest single loss of life in the Mediterranean in decades.
