ROME: Rescuers pulled 700 boat migrants to safety in the Mediterranean and found 23 bodies during one operation on Friday, an Italian coast guard spokesman said, the second loss of multiple lives recorded in the area so far this week.
After around three years of mass arrivals, the number of migrants reaching Italy has fallen sharply since July, when Rome struck a deal with Libya to block what had become a busy route for people smugglers.
A Spanish ship deployed in the European Union’s Operation Sophia naval mission recovered the dead, along with 64 survivors, from a sinking rubber boat, the mission said on its Facebook page.
“A tough day in the Central Mediterranean Sea,” the Facebook post said, adding the rescues had started in the early morning.
Six rescue operations were carried out in total on Friday, the spokesman said, making it one of the busiest days for rescues in recent months. Seven people were found dead and 900 saved on Wednesday.
The Italian Coast Guard ship Diciotti was heading for the southern port of Reggio Calabria with 764 rescued migrants on board, the ANSA news agency said in a report confirmed by the coast guard spokesman.
Diciotti was also carrying eight dead bodies, ANSA said. It was not clear if they had been among those recovered by the Spanish ship.
Those rescued were originally from Sub-Saharan Africa, Pakistan, Libya, Bangladesh, Algeria, Egypt, Nepal, Morocco, Sri Lanka, Yemen, Syria, Jordan and Lebanon, ANSA said.
In the Aegean Sea on Friday, three people drowned, six were known to be missing and scores of others were rescued while trying to reach Greece.
Some 700 migrants rescued in Mediterranean, 23 found dead
Some 700 migrants rescued in Mediterranean, 23 found dead
Afghanistan launches retaliatory attacks on Pakistan as tensions escalate
- At least 66 Afghans have been killed by Pakistan’s strikes, Afghan authorities say
- Afghanistan has called for dialogue while Pakistan ruled out any talks with Kabul
KABUL: Afghanistan has launched new attacks on Pakistan’s military bases, the Afghan defense ministry said on Saturday, as cross-border clashes escalated between the neighbors after months of tension.
The latest flare-up erupted after Pakistan’s airstrikes on Afghan territory last weekend triggered a retaliatory offensive from Afghanistan along the border on Thursday.
The two countries have engaged in tit-for-tat attacks since, marking the most serious development in ongoing tensions between the two countries, which agreed to a ceasefire last October following a week of deadly clashes.
Afghanistan’s Air Force has “once again launched airstrikes on Pakistani military bases” in Miranshah and Spinwam, the Afghan Ministry of National Defense said on X on Saturday, claiming that the strikes caused “severe damage and heavy casualties.”
“These successful operations were conducted in response to repeated aerial aggressions by the Pakistani military regime,” the ministry said.
Afghan forces also launched similar strikes against military targets in Islamabad and Abbottabad on Friday, which the ministry said was in retaliation of aerial attacks by Pakistani forces in Kabul, Kandahar and Paktia.
At least 66 Afghan civilians, mostly women and children, have been killed in Pakistani strikes, with another 59 others wounded, according to Hamdullah Fitrat, deputy spokesman for the Afghan government.
Pakistan has maintained that it is targeting only military targets to avoid any civilian casualties, in compliance with international law.
Pakistani officials said its forces have killed more than 330 Afghan fighters and targeted 37 military locations across Afghanistan.
Zabihullah Mujahid, chief spokesperson for the Afghan government, earlier called for talks to resolve the crisis.
“We have always emphasized peaceful resolution, and now too we want the issue to be resolved through dialogue,” he said on Friday.
However, Pakistan has ruled out any talks with Kabul.
“There won’t be any talks, there is nothing to talk about. There’s no negotiation. Terrorism from Afghanistan has to end,” Mosharraf Zaidi, spokesperson for Pakistan’s prime minister, said on Friday.
Pakistan is accusing the Afghan Taliban of sheltering fighters from the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan and allowing them to stage cross-border attacks — a charge Afghanistan denies, saying it does not allow its territory to be used against other countries.
As international calls for mediation grow amid the escalating hostility, Afghans across the country are growing fearful of the violence.
“Everyone heard the jets. This is the first time since the withdrawal of US invaders that we have heard such a horrible noise and news of damage. It is not good for us,” said Kandahar resident Shahid Zamari.
“We had forgotten the US war and its bad impact on us, on our families, on our children. And now this has come upon us again — by Pakistan, and in the holy month of Ramadan.”
When the strikes hit Kabul at around 1:30 a.m. on Friday, Saleema Wardak moved quickly to wake up her six children and escape outside, assuming the strong jolt that shook her house was an earthquake.
“While standing in the yard, my husband told me it was not an earthquake but an explosion. Then we heard the crazy sounds of planes, and shooting from the mountains against the planes,” she told Arab News.
“We hid inside, worried another bomb would fall on us. People say Pakistan is targeting civilians on purpose to increase pressure on the Taliban. So we hid … The world is unjust … They do not value the blood of the poor.”
For Sabawoon, a 23-year-old student from eastern Kunar province’s Asadabad city, the coming days are filled with uncertainties.
“What to do? Where to go? We have to stay and find our way to survive,” he told Arab News. “God willing, nothing bad will happen to us. If they are bombing us, what can we do?”
