A large contingent of 251 African refugees fleeing Libya arrived in Sicily on Tuesday- mostly Erireans and Nigerians; two three-year-old girls and 15 women, one of whom has had to be hospitalised with an abdominal injury,
while 116 more arrived in Malta on a boat that also carried the body of a 29-year-old woman who died during the voyage.
The refugees arriving Malta was carrying mostly Chadians and Somalis, the boat was intercepted by Maltese coast guards who received an alert from an Italian fishing boat that spotted the 50-foot (15-metre) wooden boat late Monday.
The refugees that arrived in Sicily which included Nigerians have been transferred to a temporary structure set up at Porto Empedocle in the south of the island.
A spokesman for the Maltese army said coast guards saw the refugees burning their clothes to attract the attention of passing vessels.
The refugees on the boat that arrived in Malta on Tuesday included 94 men, 18 women, a three-year-old boy and three babies. It has not yet been established how the woman on board died, the spokesman said.
Malta said it had asked Italian authorities to help with the rescue but was refused because they said the boat was 45 nautical miles from Malta and 47 nautical miles from the island of Lampedusa -- Italy's southernmost point.
Lampedusa last week refused to grant permission to enter its waters to a Maltese patrol boat which had rescued some migrants close to the island, which has been swamped with thousands of immigrants and refugees in recent weeks.
More than 1,000 people fleeing Libya have arrived in Malta in recent days.
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