VALLETTA, Malta: Malta’s navy said on Wednesday that it had rescued a total of 271 migrants from the Mediterranean in three separate operations.
The navy rescued 63 migrants in distress after their dinghy started to take in water overnight, a statement said.
A patrol boat rescued another 61 migrants after they made a distress call, and then 147 more in a third rescue, the navy said, without providing further details.
The rescued migrants were taken to Malta for health checks.
Malta has appealed to the EU for help in dealing with the flow of migrants, which its much larger neighbor Italy has begun to turn away.
Italy’s hard-line stance has increased pressure on the island nation of 450,000 people, which was already a common destination for migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean from North Africa.
Malta navy rescues 271 migrants from Mediterranean
Malta navy rescues 271 migrants from Mediterranean
- Authorities took the rescued individuals to Malta for health checks
- The country appealed to the EU for help
Two family members of Mexico’s education secretary killed in shooting
MEXICO CITY: Authorities in the western Mexican state of Colima said they killed three people suspected in the shooting deaths of two family members of Mexico’s secretary of education on Saturday.
Colima, located on Mexico’s Pacific coast, is one of the country’s most violent states. It recorded the highest homicide rate in Mexico in 2023 and 2024, according to the US State Department.
The local prosecutor’s office said officers killed three suspects in the 4:30 am (1030 GMT) shooting of two women, whom Mexico’s Secretary of Public Education Mario Delgado later identified as his aunt and cousin.
They did not identify a motive in the shooting or say whether they were searching for other suspects.
“Deep shock, outrage, and sorrow over the events that occurred this morning in Colima, where my aunt Eugenia Delgado and my cousin Sheila were brutally murdered in their home,” Delgado wrote on X on Saturday.
Officials tracked the suspects’ vehicle to a Colima home on Saturday afternoon and killed three people in a gunfight, according to the prosecutor’s office.
Investigators found weapons and clothing in the suspects’ home linked to the double shooting.
Delgado was appointed education secretary by President Claudia Sheinbaum in 2024. He previously served as national president of the ruling Morena party.
