More than 2,200 migrants dead or missing in the Mediterranean in 2024, UNICEF says

More than 2,200 people died or went missing in the Mediterranean Sea in 2024, with nearly 1,700 lives lost along the central Mediterranean migration route, UNICEF’s Regional Director for Europe and Central Asia Regina De Dominicis said.

De Dominicis, who serves as the special coordinator for refugee and migrant response in Europe, said hundreds of children and teenagers were among the casualties.

The figures were released following a New Year’s Eve shipwreck, after which approximately 20 people who had departed from Libya remained missing.

Seven survivors, including an eight-year-old boy who lost his mother, were taken to the Italian island of Lampedusa before being transferred to a reception centre in Agrigento, Sicily.