More than one-third of migrants die while fleeing conflicts in Africa. A report issued yesterday by the International Organization for Migration shows the dangerous trends in migrant deaths and disappearances over the past decade.
This was revealed as the International Organization for Migration’s Missing Migrants Project was marking its ten-year milestone. Many of them were from countries in conflict or with large refugee populations. The report highlights the dangers those fleeing conflict zones without safe pathways encounter.
However, the information on the identities of missing migrants is highly incomplete. There is a high number of unidentified deaths. Over two-thirds of migrants whose deaths were documented remain unidentified. This has left families and communities grappling with the loss of their loved ones. It also means there is a need for better-coordinated data collection and identification processes to provide closure to affected families.
IOM Deputy Director General for Operations said, “Despite the many lives lost whose identities remain unknown, we know that almost 5,500 females have perished on migration routes during the last ten years, and the number of identified children is nearly 3,500. The toll on vulnerable populations and their families urges us to turn the attention on the data into concrete action.”
The report “A Decade of Documenting Migrant Deaths” looks back at the last decade, with more than 63,000 deaths and disappearances documented during migration over that period. More deaths were recorded in 2023 than in any other year.
