A fishing vessel carrying about 150 illegal migrants sank in the Mediterranean Sea near the Libyan coast earlier this month and only two people survived, the Egyptian ambassador to Libya said Tuesday. Ambassador Mohammed Rifaah learned of the June 7 incident on Sunday, when he visited the only Egyptian survivor, Wael Nagy Abdel-Moutagali, now in prison in the northern Libyan city of Sorman. According to the survivor, the boat carried illegal immigrants of various nationalities, including about 50 Egyptians, when it sank some 65 kilometers (40 miles) off the Libyan coast, the ambassador told The Associated Press. The bodies of the dead are still being collected as they wash ashore, he added. Other nationalities on board included Moroccans, Somalians and Bangladeshis, and the only other survivor was a Bangladeshi. Rifaah said Abdel-Moutagali told him he managed to swim for a long while until a fishing boat rescued him. He was handed over to Libyan authorities who first took him to a hospital, then to a prison. «Thanks God he survived to tell us the whole story and tell us what exactly happened, » Rifaah said.
