200 migrants feared drowned

AT LEAST 200 Libyans are missing and two are dead after a fishing boat carrying hundreds of immigrants reportedly sank off the coast of Tunisia in a storm.

The boat is believed to have set sail from Libya en route to Italy with an estimated 800 would-be immigrants from sub-Saharan Africa and Asia on board, including women and children.

It stalled some 20 miles off the Kerkennah islands in southern Tunisia on Tuesday night in foul weather that hampered rescue operations.

Some 570 passengers were rescued by the Tunisian coast guard and army.

The authorities attributed the large number of missing people to a stampede to get off the ship and on to inflatable rafts during the storm, as well as the lack of resources mobilised during the rescue.