A Sicilian tourist beach was the scene of more than 100 people thought to be Syrians whose boat ran aground, a port official said. Six migrants to Italy whose dead bodies were found on Saturday on the beach.
“The bodies were reported by employees of a beach resort” near the island’s second largest city Catania, at dawn, the official said.
“We are transferring the other passengers from the little fishing boat they were in. We assume they are all Syrians,” he said, adding that they included women and young children. He did not know where they set sail from.
Italian media said the six migrants who died could not swim and drowned trying to reach the shore just 15 meters (50 feet) from where the boat ran aground.