The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) announced on Friday that the number of migrants who crossed the Mediterranean to reach Europe since early 2015 have reached a total of 237,000, surpassing the figures recorded in the entirety of 2014.
The IOM calculated that every day, an average of 1,000 migrants were rescued from barges and other unfit vessels in the Mediterranean Sea, most often off the coast of Italy and Greece, EFE reported.
"With rescues proceeding daily, IOM forecasts total migrant arrivals will surpass a quarter of a million by the end of this month. This compares with a 2014 total of 219,000," an official statement said.
The data also include migrant arrivals by sea to the coasts of Spain and Malta.
"Deaths at sea are also at record levels this year. In the last eight days there have been two more shipwrecks in the Mediterranean, pushing total fatalities calculated by IOM's Missing Migrants Project to at least 2,300," the statement added.
The Mediterranean route, particularly the path to Sicily, , the largest island in the region, has become the most dangerous for migrant and has claimed the most lives, while some 120,000 passengers managed to survive the crossing from Libya.
