This picture shows boats on the shore in Yemen's Abyan province on August 5, 2025. - / AFP
More than 90 people were killed when a migrant boat sank off Yemen's coast, Yemeni officials and a source at the International Organization for Migration told Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Tuesday, August 5, updating earlier tolls. The boat carrying mostly Ethiopian migrants sank on Sunday as it headed toward Abyan governorate in southern Yemen, a frequent destination for boats smuggling African migrants hoping to reach the wealthy Gulf states.
Late Tuesday, a Yemeni source at UN agency the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said that two bodies, which were initially buried by local fishermen after they washed up on the beach and began rotting, had been recovered. This has taken the toll of confirmed deaths from the shipwreck to 96.
Earlier, a Yemeni security source and a local official in Abyan said 94 bodies had been recovered and most of them had been buried, with the local official saying corpses were still washing up on the shore. A journalist collaborating with AFP saw at least two corpses washed up on the shore, near the area where the ship sank. He also saw worn-out tents and African people being trucked out of the remote area from which smugglers operate.
