Two days after a boat carrying about sixty migrants sank off the coast of Madagascar, the official death toll has risen to at least 34, according to authorities.

Among the people who lost their lives were three children, the Maritime Ministry of the island off Africa said.

The wreck happened on the night of Saturday to Sunday. Initially, the authorities were talking about 22 dead and 23 rescued.

According to the first information, the vessel was headed for Mayotte, an offshore French possession off the coast of south-east Africa, between Madagascar and mainland Africa.

Migrant boats often depart from the northwest coast of Madagascar for Mayotte. In February, the big island’s coast guard stopped a vessel carrying 33 citizens of the impoverished country as they tried to get to French overseas territory in the Indian Ocean.

Yesterday it was announced that two citizens of Madagascar, a man and a woman, are being sought, against whom an investigation is being carried out, as it is believed that they were “the traffickers”, according to the authorities. It is estimated that the vessel overturned because it was overloaded.

Since 2019, the French state has significantly increased its means of combating irregular immigration, deploying patrol boats and aerial surveillance in Mayotte.

In 2021, 6,355 migrants and 324 traffickers were arrested, while 459 vessels were destroyed, according to French authorities.

There are no reliable statistics on the deaths of migrants attempting the dangerous crossing from Madagascar to Mayotte. A report by the French Senate that had seen the light of day in the 2000s spoke of about a thousand deaths each year.