UN reports over 8,500 migrants died worldwide last year, a record since tallies began
GENEVA — A total of 8,565 migrants died on land and sea routes worldwide last year, the UN migration agency said on Wednesday, a record high since it started counting deaths a decade ago.
The International Organization for Migration said the biggest increase in deaths last year occurred during the treacherous crossing of the Mediterranean, from 2,411 in 2022 to 3,129. However, that was well below the record 5,136 deaths recorded in the Mediterranean in 2016, as huge numbers of Syrians, Afghans and others fled conflict to Europe.
IOM said the total number of migrant deaths in 2023 was almost 20% more than in 2022.
It said most deaths last year, about 3,700, were due to drowning.
The Geneva-based migration agency warned that the figures likely underestimate the true toll, and that factors such as improved data collection methods play a role in the calculations.
“Each of these events is a terrible human tragedy that will reverberate through families and communities for years to come,” IOM Deputy Director General Ugochi Daniels said in a statement.
Overall, the biggest jump in deaths in recent years has been in Asia, where more than 2,000 migrants died, compared to an annual average of less than 1,000 since 2014. According to IOM, 2,138 migrants died in Asia last year, 68 more then in 2022.
The increase in Asia last year was mainly due to increased deaths among Afghans fleeing to places like neighboring Iran and among Rohingya refugees on maritime routes, IOM spokesman Jorge Galindo said in an email.
IOM said there were also a record number of deaths in Africa last year – 1,866 – mainly in the Sahara and along the sea route to the Canary Islands.
The agency cited problems collecting data in remote areas, such as Panama’s dangerous “Darien Gap,” where many migrants from South America pass through on their way north.
The IOM ‘Missing Migrants’ project, which presents the figures, was set up in 2014 after a sharp increase in deaths in the Mediterranean and an influx of migrants on the Italian island of Lampedusa, off the coast of Tunisia.