Around 150 people, mostly Lebanese and Syrians, were on board the small boat that sank in the Mediterranean Sea off the Syrian city of Tartus 🇸🇾🇱🇧 News
Lebanon, which since 2019 has been mired in a financial crisis branded by the World Bank as one of the worst in modern times, has become a launchpad for illegal migration, with its own citizens joining Syrian and Palestinian refugees clamouring to leave the country.
"The number of victims from the shipwreck has reached 73 people," Syria's Health Minister Hassan al-Ghabash said in a statement, adding that 20 survivors were being treated in hospital in Tartus."I am discussing with Syria's transport minister a mechanism to retrieve the corpses from Syria," Hamie said.
"We are dealing with one of our largest ever rescue operations," Sleiman Khalil, an official at Syria's transport ministry told AFP. But the corpses of Wissam's two daughters, aged five and nine, had been returned to Lebanon where they were buried early on Friday, Ahmad said." couldn't afford his daily expenses, or the cost of enrolling his children in school," he added, saying Wissam's wife and two sons remain missing.Last year Lebanon saw a spike in the number of migrants using its shores to attempt the perilous crossing in overcrowded boats to reach Europe.
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