Scores Feared Dead in Somalia Ship Hijacking
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SANA, Yemen — Scores of Somali refugees are believed to have drowned after jumping from a ship off the coast of Yemen, while others aboard the ship died of heat exhaustion, hunger and thirst, witnesses said Tuesday.
U.N. officials said at least 120 people were dead, either aboard the ship or laid out on a beach. An unknown number of people were missing.
The Somalia-registered Gob Wein was hijacked June 5 at Mogadishu, the Somali capital, by about 3,000 refugees seeking to escape Somalia’s civil war and hunger.
For three days the ship lay off Aden, 1,200 miles to the north, before the Somalis--starving and parched, in temperatures up to 122 degrees--forced the captain to run aground Monday 150 yards from shore, shipping sources said.
Yemen apparently had refused to allow the ship to dock.
Hundreds of refugees jumped into the sea Monday. Some broke their legs jumping. Others drowned, but as many as 1,000 reportedly reached the beach.
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