Foreign Office (FO) Spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch on Tuesday confirmed that two Pakistanis had died after a wooden sailing boat carrying migrants crashed against rocks on the southern Italian coast over the weekend.

The vessel had set sail from Turkiye several days ago with migrants from Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran and several other countries, and crashed in stormy weather near Steccato di Cutro, a seaside resort on the eastern coast of Calabria, with bodies, shoes, and debris washing up along a long stretch of shoreline.

A senior official at the Pakistani embassy in Italy had met 16 Pakistani survivors of the capsised vessel on Monday while four were missing.

The FO spokesperson confirmed today that “two Pakistanis have lost their lives in the tragic incident of the boat capsised off the coast of Italy, as identified by their families.

“However, another Pakistani national has been found among survivors in the same incident, bringing the total Pakistani survivors to 17.”

The FO spokesperson said that the embassy in Italy remains engaged to assist in the matter. “Embassy officials have met survivors and are in contact with Italian authorities as well,” Baloch added.

The FO also revealed that in an earlier separate incident, “three Pakistani nationals perished in a boat wreck” near the Libyan city of Benghazi.

It added that the embassy in Libya was facilitating the process of transporting the bodies to Pakistan.

The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has launched a probe into the network of traff­ickers responsible for sending the Pakistani migrants abr­o­ad. In a statement on Mon­day, the FIA had said teams were formed to investigate the matter and arrest the traffickers who had illegally sent the victims.

The agency had also begun contacting heirs of the deceased, most of whom hailed from Punjab’s Gujrat district.

Italian police arrest three alleged traffickers

Meanwhile, the Italian police said today they have arrested three people who they believe trafficked up to 200 migrants aboard the wooden boat.

Lieutenant Colonel Alberto Lippolis said a Turkish man and two Pakistani nationals had sailed the boat from Turkey to Italy despite the terrible weather and were identified by survivors as “the main culprits of the tragedy”.

“According to initial investigations, they allegedly asked the migrants for about 8,000 euros ($8,485) each for the deadly journey,” said Lippolis, commander of a finance police team in the region of Calabria. “All three have been arrested.”

One of the Pakistanis was a minor, a judicial source said, adding that police were looking for a fourth suspect, who is Turkish.

Rescuers pulled a dead man from the sea today, bringing the number of bodies retrieved so far to 64, including about 14 children. There were 80 survivors, who said that the boat had been carrying between 150 to 200 migrants.

“We will carry on searching … the sea until we are certain that we have found everyone,” said Rocco Mortato, a member of the underwater diving team of the fire brigade.

‘Traumatised’

Teams from the Doctors Without Borders (MSF) charity were providing psychological support to the survivors.

“They are heavily traumatised. Everyone has lost someone,” said Mara Eliana Tunno, an MSF psychologist.

One 12-year-old boy had lost his entire family, while a 16-year-old boy from Afghanistan has lost his sister.

“He didn’t have the courage to tell his parents,” Tunno said.

The tragedy has fuelled a debate on migration in Europe and Italy, where the recently elected right-wing government’s tough new laws for migrant rescue charities have drawn criticism from the United Nations and others.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said in an interview on Monday that she had written to European Union institutions calling for immediate action by the bloc to stop migrant boat trips so as to prevent more deaths.

“The more people depart, the more risk dying,” she told RAI public television. “The only way to tackle this issue seriously, with humanity, is to stop the departures.”

Hundreds of thousands of migrants have reached Italy by boat over the past decade, fleeing conflict and poverty back home.

The United Nations Missing Migrants Project has registered more than 20,000 deaths and disappearances in the central Mediterranean since 2014, including more than 220 this year, making it the most dangerous migrant route in the world.

A group of politicians from the Green party demonstrated in front of Meloni’s office on Tuesday to demand why more wasn’t done to save the migrants when their crowded vessel was spotted on Saturday.

Police have said that patrol boats were sent to intercept the migrants, but severe weather forced them to return to port.