At least 49 people have died of thirst in a remote part of the Sahara desert in northern Niger after the truck carrying them broke down, the authorities say.<\/p>\n
The group were returning from Mali, where they had attended celebrations for the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha, when they ran out of water, stranded more than 80km (50 miles) west of Assamaka, a major border crossing point between Niger and Algeria.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe travellers found themselves trapped in the heart of a hostile environment where extreme temperatures and lack of supply points make survival extremely difficult,\u201d said the governor of Agadez.<\/p>\n
Only two survived, trekking across the desert to Assamaka, where they alerted the authorities.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is something we have been working against, for years,\u201d Chehuo Azizou, the head of a local NGO, told the BBC.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have been sensitising drivers, travellers and any person involved immigration activities about the risk of crossing the desert. This recent incident is not unusual. Generally, we witness such cases on the route heading to Libya or Algeria.\u201d<\/p>\n
In this latest case, the lorry had departed from the Malian town of Telhandek but veered away from its intended route, the Agadez governor\u2019s statement said.<\/p>\n
The driver and passengers made repeated attempts to repair the vehicle over several days, but their efforts ultimately proved unsuccessful.<\/p>\n
\u201cDeprived of water and unable to repair the vehicle\u201d most were unable to survive, the statement added.<\/p>\n
\u201cDozens of lifeless bodies were found under the immobile truck and in its surroundings,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n
The victims, all nationals of Niger, were buried in mass graves by the rescue team dispatched to the area by local authorities.<\/p>\n
While returning from the scene, the rescue team said it came across another broken-down lorry carrying more than 60 people, who had been stranded for three days after a battery failure.<\/p>\n
The lorry had set off from the Malian town of Harouba, more than 300km from the Niger border, the governor said in a follow-up statement.<\/p>\n
The rescue team, which included Nigerien troops, distributed water to the \u201cexhausted and distressed travellers\u201d and helped repair the vehicle, allowing them to safely resume their journey.<\/p>\n
The Niger desert remains a major transit corridor for migrants from across West Africa trying to reach Europe, repeatedly defying the risks associated with the perilous journey.<\/p>\n
The governor of the nearest city, Agadez, said the tragedy underscored the \u201cvulnerability of young people engaged in migratory and cross-border economic activities, often forced to pass through unstable areas in order to survive or seek better living conditions\u201d.<\/p>\n
The post Nearly 50 people die of thirst in Sahara desert after lorry breaks down<\/a> appeared first on KBC Digital<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" At least 49 people have died of thirst in a remote part of the Sahara desert in northern Niger after the truck carrying them broke down, the authorities say. The group were returning from Mali, where they had attended celebrations for the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha, when they ran out of water, stranded more […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-143221","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143221","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=143221"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143221\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=143221"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=143221"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=143221"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}