
ROME: More than 1,000 migrants were brought ashore in southern Italy on Saturday after coast guard crews launched major rescue operations for three boats struggling in rough seas off Calabria.
One coast guard vessel brought 584 people to the city of Reggio Calabria, while another escorted a packed fishing boat carrying 487 migrants into the port of Crotone, close to the scene of a Feb 26 shipwreck that killed at least 74 people.