The Tunisian coastguard has recovered 15 more bodies of migrants, a security official told Reuters on Thursday, bringing the death toll from a shipwreck off Tunisia to 25.
A wooden boat carrying about 110 migrants sank on Wednesday off the coast of the city of Sfax, 76 people were rescued, with the rest still missing.
Drownings off Tunisia have increased significantly in recent weeks, leaving dozens dead and missing, amid a sharp increase in the number of migrant boats heading to Italy from the Tunisian coast.
Brigadier General Hossam Eddine Jebabli, spokesman for the General Directorate of the Tunisian National Guard, said the coast guard recovered the bodies of 14 migrants, including six women from African countries, as well as one Tunisian, the captain of the boat.
The National Guard said more than 14,5 migrants, mostly from sub-Saharan Africa, were intercepted or rescued during the first three months of the year as they tried to cross into Europe, five times the figures for the same period last year.
Tunisia has replaced Libya as a major departure point for migrants fleeing hardship and conflict in Africa and the Middle East in the hope of a better life in Europe.
The EU's border agency reported that the number of people seeking to reach the bloc across the Mediterranean in the first three months of 2023 increased threefold last year, and the UN's International Organization for Migration said the first quarter of this year saw the highest number of migrant deaths since the same period in 3.
On Tuesday, the Italian government declared a state of emergency in dealing with the migration issue after a "significant increase" in the flow of migrants across the Mediterranean, in a move that allows it to return unwanted migrants more quickly.