September 30, 2014

22,000 migrants died on their way to Europe

editor:	Murat Suner

International Organization for Migration (IOM) released the world’s most comprehensive tally to date of migrant fatalities across land and sea, called “Fatal Journeys: Tracking Lives Lost During Migration”.

With a count surpassing 40,000 victims since 2000, IOM calls on all the world’s governments to address what it describes as “an epidemic of crime and victimization.”

“Our message is blunt: migrants are dying who need not,” said IOM Director General William Lacy Swing, “It is time to do more than count the number of victims. It is time to engage the world to stop this violence against desperate migrants.”

The research behind “Fatal Journeys,” which runs to over 200 pages, began with the October 2013 tragedy when over 400 migrants died in two shipwrecks near the Italian island of Lampedusa.

The report, compiled under IOM’s Missing Migrants Project, indicates Europe is the world’s most dangerous destination for “irregular” migration, costing the lives of over 3,000 migrants this year.

Calculations based on incidents compiled by The Migrants Files, a joint project conducted under the aegis of Journalism++ , suggests over 22,000 migrants have died trying to reach Europe since 2000, mainly on treacherous routes across the Mediterranean Sea.

Further information about IOM can be retrieved here.