ADDIS ABABA, June 11, 2025 (BSS/AFP) - At least eight people died and 22 were 
missing after smugglers forced migrants to disembark from a boat in the Red 
Sea, the UN's migration agency said on Wednesday.

The boat had around 150 passengers when it was stopped by the smugglers who 
were carrying them last Thursday, forcing them to disembark midway through 
their journey.

"The passengers were left to swim for their lives in open water," the 
International Organization for Migration (IOM) said in a statement.

It was not clear why the smugglers forced the group to disembark. 

Each year, thousands of African migrants brave the "Eastern Route" across the 
Red Sea from Djibouti to Yemen in the hope of eventually reaching oil-rich 
Gulf countries. 

Last year, the IOM recorded at least 558 deaths on the route, with 462 
resulting from shipwrecks.

The IOM said at least five bodies from last week's incident had been found 
washed up on the Djibouti coast.

"These young people were forced into impossible choices by smugglers who show 
no regard for human life," Frantz Celestin, IOM regional director for East, 
Horn and Southern Africa, said.

"Every life lost at sea is a tragedy that should never happen," Celestin 
added.

According to IOM, 2024 "was marked by six major shipwrecks caused by the use 
of unseaworthy boats, overcrowding of vessels, navigating in poor maritime 
conditions, and smugglers forcing people to disembark at sea". 

Once in Yemen, migrants often face other threats to their safety, with the 
country the poorest in the Arabian Peninsula and in the grip of civil war for 
more than a decade.