At least 10 people died and more than 30 are still missing after a boat carrying migrants sank off the coast of Tunisia, officials said on Wednesday.
Tunisian cost guard rescued 76 migrants from the same shipwreck, the national guard official Houssem Eddin Jebabli said.
Faouzi Masmoudi, a judge from the city of Sfax, told Reuters that up to 30 people were still missing.
The past month has seen a sharp increase in migrant boats trying to reach the Italian coast from Tunisia, leading to a spike in drowning accidents as vessels are often rickety and overcrowded with unreliable engines. In March at least 52 migrants died and 70 went missing in similar disasters.
The National Guard said this month that more than 14,000 migrants, mostly from sub-Saharan Africa, were intercepted or rescued in the first three months of the year while trying to cross to Europe, five times more than figures recorded in the same period last year.
The sharp increase is partly due to Tunisia taking over from Libya as a main departure point for people fleeing poverty and conflict in Africa and the Middle East in the hope of a better life in Europe.
Crackdowns on human trafficking in Libya in recents months have made Tunisia a more accessible option.
More than a thousand schools were closed in France on Tuesday and the top floor of the Eiffel Tower was shut to tourists as a severe heatwave continued to grip Europe, triggering health alerts across the region.
Thailand's Constitutional Court on Tuesday suspended Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra from duty pending a case seeking her dismissal, in a major setback for a government under fire on multiple fronts and fighting for its survival.
President Donald Trump has signed an executive order terminating a US sanctions programme on Syria, allowing an end to the country's isolation from the international financial system and building on Washington's pledge to help it rebuild after a devastating civil war.
Former criminology graduate student Bryan Kohberger has agreed to plead guilty to killing four Idaho college students in 2022, a move that would spare him the death penalty under a deal with prosecutors, according to the family of one of the victims.
US President Donald Trump plans to host Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House on July 7, a US official said, as the American leader pressed for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, and the return of remaining hostages.
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