Rome, August 17 (RHC)-- Italian and Norwegian authorities have discovered the bodies of 49 migrants who appear to have asphyxiated to death in the hold of an overcrowded fishing boat as they tried to cross the Mediterranean to Europe.
More than 300 people on deck were rescued, but those in the hold died amid exhaust fumes and suffocating heat.
The war in Syria has helped fuel the worst refugee crisis since World War II; at least 2,300 people have died this year trying to reach Europe by boat.
