The arrests follow statements made by survivors rescued from the same migrant boat earlier this week and taken to Palermo in Sicily.
When it left Libya, the migrant boat was carrying a total of nearly 500 people. The suspected traffickers were seven Moroccans, two Syrians and a Libyan.
"All the statements by the migrants confirm the same version of events," Palermo prosecutor Maurizio Scalia told a press conference. "The victims were all violently forced to stay below deck in an awful condition."
AFP
dailystar.com.lb
28/8/15
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Libya recovered 105 bodies after a boat packed with migrants sank in the Mediterranean Sea and said almost 100 more people were missing and feared dead....
ReplyDeleteThe vessel sank on Thursday after leaving Zuwara, a major launchpad for smugglers shipping migrants to Italy by exploiting a security vacuum in Libya where rival governments are fighting for control four years after the ousting of Muammar Gaddafi.
Lacking navy ships, Libyan officials were searching for survivors with fishing boats and inflatables provided by locals. About 198 people had been rescued by noon, officials said.
“The boat was in a bad condition and people died with us,” said Ayman Talaal, a Syrian survivor, standing next to his daughter. “We have been forced into this route. It’s now called the grave of the Mediterranean Sea.”
Local officials and residents were putting bodies into red bags on a beach littered with shoes, trousers and other personal items from drowned migrants. A blue inflatable brought in more bodies.
“We, the Red Crescent, work with nothing. Some fishermen help us with a boat,” said Ibrahim al-Attoushi, an official at the Red Crescent in Zuwara. “We only have one ambulance car.”...............http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/2015/08/28/Migrants-boat-sinks-off-Libyan-coast-hundreds-feared-dead.html