The Forgotten Shipwreck Our World

In the 21st century, the Mediterranean Sea is fast becoming a

mass grave. This year so far, 4700 people have drowned on the open sea.

Very few sinkings have been properly investigated. Until now. What we

believe is the worst sinking of 2016 took place at night, at sea. There

is no footage so we've had to build a picture from the survivors

scattered across Europe. It is a story of grief.

Frustration. Do you think the authorities have done enough to

investigate Mr Mark accusations of murder. Do you think this is murder?

Yeah, this one. This one. And international inaction. There has

been no investigation so far. Are you comfortable with that? Not

really, no. This is the story of the forgotten shipwreck.

On April 16 this year, a small fishing boat was picked up off the

Greek coast. On board, 37 survivors. They said they'd come from Libya and

so did the UNHCR. Perhaps as many as 500 people drowned a few days ago.

We don't know exactly when. When a large ship went down between Libya

and Italy. But when Stephen Gray from Reuters talked to survivors he

started to question the official version. It was their own language,

the way they were holding back about some details, the way they were very

vague about certain things, that they had all apparently lost their

phones, but they couldn't remember who, for example, they had paid

money to get on this voyage and the dates they were giving didn't really

add up. And the details of how they had apparently simply drifted from

the scene of this disaster off the coast of Libya to a rescue point

halfway between Greece and Italy, it didn't seem, to me, to add up.

Together with Reuters, Newsnight set up to find out what really happened.

I am not thinking to go out from this ocean... Muaz Ayimo is one of

the survivors of the sinking. He had hoped to build a new life in Europe

with his wife and baby boy. Muaz Ayimo, his wife and daughter along

with 200 other migrants were voted off a small fishing feeder boat onto

a deep sea fishing trawler. It is going to take them across the

Mediterranean to Italy but the trawler was already crammed with 300

people. These two young men rocked the top

deck of the trawler when it capsized. They made it to France.

Overloaded boats can sync all too easily. At least this boat capsized

in daylight when migrants crowded to one side after spotting an Italian

naval ship. The trawler in our story sank at night. The physics of the

sinking are simple. 500 people way roughly ten times. At ten tons of

cargo shifts suddenly, then a boat can capsize.

Ibsa was the last person Muaz was able to save. Ibsa, how many people

were in the water when the feeder boat left?

There is no video of what happened that night so we are going back with

old technology. We have asked Muaz to draw.

Do you think this is murder? Yeah, this one is murder, this one. Muaz

is housed in a refugee centre. He is one of the lucky ones. At almost 100

people in the water, almost all were abandoned. As far as we can tell,

there has been no official investigation into the sinking of

this shift in the eastern Mediterranean but the evidence is

available. There are survivors living in refugee centres like this

one behind me and that points to not just mass killing but something

darker than that. Murder. When the smugglers boat when the smugglers

boat sailed away, leaving those people in the water, do you think

that was murder? There is clear evidence from

multiple sources pointing to murder at sea. But there is a crucial fact

that everyone has overlooked, an error that has prevented the

relatives of the dead getting any kind of justice. The survivors told

everyone they came from Libya but that was a lie. The boat left not

from Libya but here in Egypt. Was the story about Tobruk true?

Libya is in chaos but Egypt is firmly under the helm of its

strongman president, Sisi. So there is a big question, what is ejected

doing to police its people smugglers? Not it seems. The

migrants bought their tickets here in Cairo bomb brokers. 500 people on

the boat, many at $2000 each. That could be as much as $1 million

gross. Even after expenses, the smugglers are making a killing. I

travelled to a village in the Nile Delta when nine boys who were on the

boat came from. To many people in Europe, a migrant

boat sinking might seem like yet another grim statistic. For this

town, it was far, far worse than that. The list of the missing on her

village starts with her own son. When you hear about these mass

sinkings in the Mediterranean, you hear about Libya, not teach it. But

our investigation has shown that as many as -- as many as 150 Egyptians

may have died in this tragedy. The Egyptian authorities haven't

investigated so you might well ask, why is that? Have the Egyptian

authorities got something to hide? One consequence of the investigation

is relatives cannot get closure. -- no investigation. In the absence of

hard facts, conspiracy theories flight. For example, thinking, what

thinking? -- sinking, what sinking? Because there has been no full

enquiry, she believes her son may still be alive. But other people in

the village are less optimistic. This man's two sons are also still

missing. Do you think the Egyptian

authorities have done enough to get to the bottom of what happened?

The village is divided about what happened. But this is what our

investigation understands of the doomed voyage. The migrants leave

the beach at Alexandria at night in small boats like these. They are

picked up by the smugglers' feeder boat, which goes to the trawler in

international waters. While they are transferring them to the trawler,

hundreds of refugees, roughly 500 people in all, capsized. This is

Miami Beach, Alexandria, where many migrants say their voyage started.

Over there, that plays with the little hut, that is a military post.

The idea that hundreds of migrants could leave this place without being

seen, that is a little far-fetched. The evidence linking the disaster to

two smugglers comes from this man. Abdelhamid is the father of an

Egyptian. He went to the police and they carried out a curious

investigation which said there was no manslaughter or murder, but only

financial fraud. The police have said this is a fraud case. Is this

right? Do you think the authorities have

done enough to investigate this tragedy? The alleged leaders of the

smuggling gang are known by their nicknames, the doctor, and Al-Bougi.

This man claims the man was sent by Al-Bougi.

We wanted to ask this man, lack of three, about his alleged role in the

sinking,, but no one was in. -- Al-Bougy. We were told he was on the

run. The doctor did not return calls made by our investigation. Back in

Cairo, we set out to track down the Somali broker, and wanted to

challenge him in the loss of so many lives and his role in that. But the

secret police had other ideas. We are trying to interview this man. We

have been stopped by some secret police. We are not free to leave. We

are waiting for the police to talk to us some more. We are now being

escorted to the police station. Isn't that nice? Comically, the

Egyptian authorities are more keen on preventing journalism than people

smuggling. As a result, the drownings continue. In September,

another overloaded vessel sank off the coast of Egypt. But this time so

close to the shore that authorities were compelled to act. 200 people

drowned. Had the tragedy being properly investigated, the second

loss of life that was massive could perhaps be have been avoided. In

Egypt, a spokesman for the Minister for Justice said if the current of

such a crime is proven, Egypt will certainly not hesitate to conduct

the necessary investigations to uncovered it and arrest the

perpetrators and bring them to justice. The Egyptian Ministry of

Justice did carry out an investigation, but recently carried

out laws against illegal migration and are determined to take action

against the smugglers. But Egypt is not the only country with questions

to answer. In Greece, the country where the survivors arrived, there

has been no investigation. Nobody has held anyone to account for the

deaths or even opened in enquiry into the shipwreck. As well as the

tragic loss of life, Europe's own security is being undermined. Went

to The Hague to ask the head of the European police agency, Europe all,

why it had failed. We believe 500 people drowning is the biggest mass

drowning of 2016. So far there has been no investigation. Are you

comfortable with that? Not really, no. This is a humanitarian disaster.

The absence of clear answers in this case need to be referred to the

authorities involved and reflect the difficulty in getting to the heart

of the story and getting information from the survivors. And there is

really some investigators problem in identifying who is responsible. --

investigative. The numbers are massive, 500 people paying $2000 per

person. The gangsters are getting away with it, are they not? We have

a sizeable criminal community between Europe and Africa and the

Middle East in the last year. We have identified over 50,000 people

smugglers are operating. It is a criminal industry worth at least $5

billion a year. 100 people in the water when the smugglers' boat left.

That is murder, isn't it? It would need to be tested in a court of law

but it does not sound very healthy, does it? Nobody is owning up to

this. Europol has not done an investigation because no one has

complained to you. You are powerless. No, of course. We can

institute a full range of expertise and capabilities that we have at

Europol. We have used it in many cases to hunt down and successfully

target these people smuggling organisations. In this case, I think

there has been some good work done in your investigation. I would like

to receive the investigated file you have so we can look at it again and

take it to the authorities so we can see if there is much more we can do.

If these mass sinkings are not thoroughly investigated, three

things will continue to happen, the first is the smugglers will continue

to get more rich. The second is Europe will not be able to put

pressure on post countries like Egypt. In the third, the worst of

all, is that thousands of people will continue to drown. People in

Europe who feel anxious about so-called Islamic State hiding among

the migrants will feel no safer if the smugglers are allowed to carry

on with impunity. And for the people who have lost loved ones, no

investigation means grief without end.

It is pretty damp out there. More rain on the way for Saturday. Heavy

rain, actually. That is worse for southern areas of the UK. On top of

that, we will start to see slightly cooler air coming our way as