Nearly 830 African migrants from Tripoli and Misurata in Libya who
arrived on the Italian Island of Linosa between 26-28 March are
today being transferred to Sicily.

The migrants are mostly from Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan and
Somalia, but there are also some sub-Saharan Africans. This is the
first group of migrants fleeing Libya to arrive in Italy since the
onset of the Libyan crisis more than a month ago.

IOM staff say 80 women and 12 children are among the passengers.
One woman gave birth to a healthy baby assisted by an Italian
medical team. The woman was immediately transferred by helicopter
to Lampedusa for medical assistance.

The vessels were intercepted by the Italian coastguards and
taken to the small Island of Linosa some 40 kilometres from the
island of Lampedusa, where more than 6,000 Tunisian migrants are
currently hosted in increasingly difficult conditions.

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IOM staff on Lampedusa say the Italian authorities avoided
sending the new arrivals to Lampedusa not only because of the
overcrowding and lack of facilities on the island, but also because
of growing tension among the island’s inhabitants, unhappy
over the increasing numbers of migrants.

The new arrivals are likely to be first sent to a migrant
reception centre at Porto Empedocle in Sicily before being taken to
the Mineo reception centre, near Catania.

The arrivals from Libya present a new challenge to the Italian
government which is still trying to find accommodation for
thousands of migrants currently hosted on Lampedusa, Puglia and
Sicily. More than 18,430 Tunisian migrants have arrived on
Lampedusa since February, nearly 1,580 at the weekend.

In 2008 the Italian government signed a friendship treaty with
Libya which led to a drastic reduction of irregular immigration.
However, the continued violence in Libya has seen a temporary
suspension of the agreement.

The Italian government has sought increased assistance from the
European Union to help it deal with increasing populations of the
migrants and asylum seekers.

For more information, please call:

Flavio Di Giacomo

IOM Rome

Tel: +39 34 708 98 996

E-mail: "mailto:fdigiacomo@iom.int">fdigiacomo@iom.int