IOM: at least 22 migrants die in two incidents south of Crete as boats from eastern Libya get into distress

At least 22 people died in two separate incidents south of Crete over the weekend, after boats that had left eastern Libya got into distress at sea, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said on Monday 9 November. Greek authorities took part in one of the rescues.

The UN migration agency described the Crete deaths as part of a wider toll of at least 56 people lost in a series of shipwrecks off Senegal and Greece in the space of a few days.

What happened south of Crete

According to the IOM, in the first incident Greek authorities rescued 28 Sudanese migrants and recovered eight bodies, and several people were reported missing. In the second, a cargo ship spotted a vessel in distress; 18 survivors were rescued and 14 bodies were recovered. The agency did not say in the material published by UN News where on the Crete route the two boats were found, and the figures are the IOM’s own.

The agency said arrivals on the eastern Libya to Crete route have risen this year and that gaps in search and rescue capacity are heightening concerns about the risks people face on the crossing.

The Senegal shipwreck

The rest of the weekend’s toll comes from the Atlantic. At least 34 people died on Friday when a boat carrying migrants capsized near Loumpoul, between Dakar and Saint-Louis, in northwestern Senegal. One survivor was rescued and an unknown number of people remain missing, according to Senegalese authorities and public reports cited by the IOM. Search operations were continuing and the death toll remains provisional. On the Western African Atlantic Route the IOM has recorded at least 454 deaths and disappearances so far this year, as of 26 October, which it described as minimum estimates.

The IOM’s call

IOM Director General Amy Pope said those who died were “mothers, fathers, sons and daughters” who had left home hoping for a better life. She said smugglers and traffickers had charged them for journeys on boats that were not fit for the sea, and that these networks “profit from desperation”. Countries, she said, must go after them together and give people safe, legal ways to move.

The IOM called for sustained cooperation among countries of origin, transit and destination, including coordinated search and rescue, support for survivors and the families of the missing, stronger action against smuggling networks and expanded safe and regular migration pathways.

The same agency and the UN Office on Drugs and Crime reported in October that smuggling on European sea routes generated up to half a billion dollars last year, as Geopolitiki reported in UN: migrants paid up to $509 million to smugglers on sea routes to Europe in 2025, with 3,404 dead or missing.