Al-Khamis Al-Bosaifi said aid workers were still recovering the bodies,
many of them women, and that the circumstances in which the migrants
died were not clear.
The bodies of at least 25 migrants who drowned trying to cross the Mediterranean were found washed up on a beach in western Libya near the city of Zuwara on Thursday, a Red Crescent official said on Thursday.
Hundreds
of migrants have died in boat accidents this week amid a surge in
departures from the North African coast towards Italy. Many of the boats
are believed to have left from the shore around Zuwara and Sabratha in
Libya's northwest.
Al-Khamis Al-Bosaifi said aid
workers were still recovering the bodies, many of them women, and that
the circumstances in which the migrants died were not clear.
A
coastguard spokesman in Tripoli said no migrant boats had been
intercepted over the past two days, with rougher seas preventing
patrols.
So far this year more than 40,000
migrants have crossed the Mediterranean Sea from North Africa to Italy
by paying people smugglers for the journey, broadly in line with a steep
increase in numbers since 2014.
Smugglers in
Libya have exploited political chaos and lawlessness to expand their
activities along routes from sub-Saharan Africa, often working with
local militias.
The head of the European Union's
Mediterranean naval mission recently said that people smuggling was
estimated to account for between 30 and 50 percent of the gross domestic
product in northwestern Libya.
Migrants pay
smugglers hundreds of dollars for a place on boats, often flimsy
inflatable craft that either sink or are picked up by international
rescue missions.
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