Rashid (Egypt) - An Egyptian court sentenced 56 people to prison on Sunday over the capsizing of a migrant boat that left over 200 people dead last year. The defendants were sentenced to at least seven years in jail, judicial sources said, with some sentences extending to 13 or 14 years. One woman was acquitted. The boat was bound for Italy when it sank eight miles (12km) off the Egyptian port city of Rosetta. Some 450 migrants were estimated to have been crowded aboard, including around 100 trapped in its hold. There were 163 survivors, mostly Egyptian. Syrian, Sudanese, Eritrean and Somali migrants had also been on board. A record 5 000 migrants drowned in the Mediterranean last year, aid agencies have said. In the worst known incident, around 500 African migrants and their children died when a fishing boat capsized off Egypt's coast in April.
