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Med Migrants in Distress

FILE: Rescued migrants look out to sea on the Geo Barents rescue ship, operated by Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders), as the ship makes its way to the Italian port of Bari, in the central Mediterranean Sea March 25, 2023

UPDATED AGAIN WITH MIGRANT BOAT PROVISIONED WITHOUT RESCUE: ROME - Italy's coast guard said it was trying on Monday to rescue 1,200 more migrants aboard two boats on the Mediterranean Sea after saving about 2,000 already over the weekend.

It's coast guard said the rescue of about 800 migrants aboard an overloaded fishing boat located in Italian waters more than 190 kilometers southeast of Syracuse, in Sicily, was ongoing..

The operation - involving three patrol boats and a merchant ship, all coordinated by the "Nave Peluso" coast guard boat - was described as "complex" due to the overcrowding.

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Nearly 1,700 Migrants Reach Italian Island

A second fishing vessel carrying 400 migrants and also in Italian waters had been intercepted by the coast guard ship "Diciotti" 170 miles southeast of Capo Passero, at the southernmost tip of Sicily.

Two merchant vessels were assisting in that rescue, the coast guard said.

Alarm Phone, a hotline used by migrants in distress, said on Twitter on Monday that the people onboard were "in panic".

In another migrant boast incident, a merchant ship has supplied fuel and water to a boat with around 400 migrants on board which is in distress between Greece and Malta but Maltese authorities have ordered it not to conduct a rescue, German NGO Sea-Watch International said on Monday.

The vessel, which departed from Tobruk in Libya amid a sharp rise of migrant boats crossing the Mediterranean from North Africa, was reported to be adrift and taking on water by support service Alarm Phone early on Sunday.

Alarm Phone tweeted on Sunday that, according to a woman onboard, several people onboard needed medical care, including a child, a pregnant woman and a disabled person.

Three people in distress had jumped overboard and one fell unconscious, it wrote.

On Sunday, German aid group ResQship said at least two migrants had died and about 20 others were missing after their vessel sank overnight Saturday to Sunday after leaving Tunisia.

ResQship told AFP its charity boat had rescued 22 people from the shipwreck and took them to Lampedusa, helped by "good cooperation" with the Italian coastguard.

According to interior ministry figures, more than 14,000 migrants have arrived in Italy since the beginning of the year - significantly more than the 5,300 who had arrived over the same period in 2022 and the 4,300 during 2021.

This report was sourced from Reuters and Agence France-Presse.