Hundreds of would-be immigrants are feared dead after two boats carrying more than 500 people sank off the shores of Libya over the past few days.
News reports say 21 people have been confirmed dead, while hundreds of others are still missing, according to Libyan officials.
The deaths resulted from at least two separate incidents over the past two days, but there is no clear information as to how many boats capsized and how many people are dead.
The first incident involved a fishing boat carrying more than 250 would-be immigrants from Africa to Italy. Twenty-one people drowned and the rest are missing.
Another boat carrying more than 350 also went down. The Libyan coastguard rescued 23 people and is still searching for the rest of the passengers.
Libyan officials said the dead and missing were from North African and sub-Saharan countries.
Because of its proximity to Italy, Libya is often used as a departure point for illegal African immigrants seeking a better life in Europe.
The two countries have signed several agreements to increase cooperation and stem the flow of illegal immigrants from Libya to Italy.
William Spindler, a spokesman for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, said there had been an increase in illegal immigration over the past few weeks as the weather was getting warmer and more people were taking the risk.
Last year, some 36,000 people made the journey through Libya to Europe, Spindler said.
Some 70 percent of the immigrants claim asylum, and of them, half are granted the status when it is established they are fleeing war, violence or persecution rather than just seeking a better economic situation, Spindler said.
Although many do not carry documents and are traveling in an irregular way, they might have valid reasons to make the journey according to international law, he said.
Unlike the situation in the Gulf of Aden, where smugglers frequently throw their passengers into shark-infested waters so as not to get caught, Spindler said the situation in the Mediterranean Sea was different in that the smugglers rarely traveled with their passengers.
Rather, they provided them with a vessel, food, water, fuel and sometimes a navigation device and a cell phone for emergency calls, but do not accompany them on the journey. This reinforces the theory that the recent incidents were accidental and not a deliberate act of sabotage.