ADDIS ABABA, Feb. 1 (Xinhua) -- The International Organization for Migration (IOM) said on Friday that the death toll from the sinking of two migrant boats off the coast of Djibouti on Tuesday has reached 58.
"As of Friday afternoon, IOM's team has learned that the remains of 58 victims have been recovered," the IOM said in a statement.
The UN migration agency said on Wednesday that 16 survivors were saved from the sinking in Obock, along Djibouti's Red Sea coast, with the help of a team of gendarmeries who were deployed in the area.
The tragedy occurred during the early hours of Tuesday off Godoria, a locality in the Obock region of northeast Djibouti.
It was said to be one of many similar deadly calamities that have occurred on Djibouti's Red Sea coast area, as desperate east African migrants attempt to cross the dangerous route hoping to reach the Middle East via war-torn Yemen. They are mainly aiming at reaching Yemen's northern neighbor, Saudi Arabia.
According to IOM's Missing Migrants Project (MMP) data released on Wednesday, more than 199 drowning have been recorded off the coast of Obock, Djibouti, since the year 2014.
The MMP had also revealed records of three major shipwrecks of craft departing Obock before Tuesday's tragedy. Similar incidents since 2014 had resulted in the death of hundreds of desperate migrants along the dangerous Bab-el-Mandeb strait.
The strait, located between Yemen on the Arabian Peninsula and Djibouti and Eritrea in the Horn of Africa, connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden.
