More refugees and migrants have been "deliberately drowned" by human smugglers for the second time in 24 hours off the coast of Yemen, according to the United Nations migration agency. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) said in a statement late on Thursday that its staff found six bodies on the beach - two male and four female - and 13 people are still missing.

It said 84 migrants left the beach before IOM staff arrived while it provided emergency medical assistance as well as food and water to 57 surviving migrants. The UN migration agency said 160 Ethiopian migrants were violently forced into the Arabian Sea on Thursday. "It is indeed a very dramatic situation," Laurent de Boeck, the agency's chief for Yemen, told Al Jazeera from Brussels on Thursday. "They were in a boat with smugglers, who dropped them at sea before arriving at the shore. Some people have disappeared. But others were actually buried by their friends on the beaches."

De Boeck said the incident was reported by some of the survivors, whom he described as "exhausted and under shock". "This situation is new," he said, adding that "it is the first time" that his agency documented people being forced out of the boats by smugglers before reaching the shores.

De Boeck said that the civil war in Yemen and the collapse of the state have allowed "criminal networks to act freely", endangering many refugees and migrants.

Courtesy:Al Jazeera