BENGHAZI (Reuters) – At least 29 bodies of migrants have been recovered in two locations in the southeast and west of Libya, a security directorate and the Libyan Red Crescent said on Thursday.
The Alwahat district Security Directorate said in a statement that 19 bodies were discovered in a mass grave in a farm in Jikharra area, some 441 km from Benghazi, Libya’s second largest city, and said the deaths were related to smuggling activites.
The directorate posted on Facebook pictures showing police officers and Jalu Red Crescent volunteers placing the bodies in black plastic bags.
Separately, the Libyan Red Crescent said on Facebook late Thursday evening that its volunteers recovered the bodies of 10 migrants earlier in the day after their boat sank off Dila port in the city of Zawiya, some 40 km from Tripoli, the capital.
The Red Crescent posted pictures showing volunteers on the dockside placing bodies in white plastic bags, while one volunteer put numbers on one of the bags.
“In the presence of the Public Prosecution Office in Jalu, the directorate was able to recover 19 bodies resulting from smuggling and illegal migration activities in Jikharra area, belonging to a known smuggling network,” the directorate said.
It said the bodies were found in a total of three graves on the farm, with one grave holding one body, a second grave holding four bodies, and the remaining 14 bodies found in the third grave.
“The bodies were all referred to a forensic doctor to conduct the necessary tests,” the directorate said.
Libya has turned into a transit route for migrants fleeing conflict and poverty to Europe across the Mediterranean.
At the end of January, Alwahat Criminal Investigation Department said it had freed 263 migrants from different Sub-Saharan nationalities, saying they were “being held by a smuggling gang in extremely poor human and health conditions.”
(Reporting by Ahmed Elumami and Ayman Werfali; writing by Ahmed Elumami; Editing by Leslie Adler)
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