Migrant deaths in Mediterranean reach highest level in 6 years
CBSN
The number of migrant deaths in the Central Mediterranean in the first three months of 2023 reached their highest point in six years, according to a new report Wednesday from the United Nations International Organization for Migration (IOM).
In the first quarter of the year, the IOM documented 441 deaths of migrants attempting to cross what the agency calls "the world's most dangerous maritime crossing." It's the highest fatality count for a three-month period since the first quarter of 2017, when 742 deaths were recorded, according to IOM numbers.
Every year thousands of migrants, in sometimes rickety and overcrowded smuggler boats, attempt to reach Europe's southern shores from North Africa.
Russia launched a barrage of missiles at Ukraine Thursday in its first major retaliation for Ukraine's attack earlier in the week on a military facility in the Russian region of Bryansk. That strike saw the Ukrainians use American-made and supplied long-range missiles known as ATACMS, which President Biden had given the Ukrainian forces permission to fire deeper into Russian territory only two days earlier.
Amersham, England — Family and friends of One Direction star Liam Payne, who died last month after falling from a Buenos Aires hotel room, gathered for his funeral in Britain on Wednesday. Payne's former bandmates Harry Styles, Niall Horan, Zayn Malik and Louis Tomlinson were among mourners at the private service at St Mary's Church in Amersham, Buckinghamshire, just outside London.