The Armed Forces of Malta's Swift-class P-23 patrol boat yesterday landed a group of 12 illegal migrants who had been intercepted some 24 nautical miles off Wied iz-Zurrieq.

The P-23 intercepted the migrants in their eight-metre black fibreglass boat at 6am in relatively good sea conditions. The group was made up of six males, five females and a young girl, who appeared to be suffering from a severe facial eczema skin condition.

The migrants were landed at the maritime squadron's base in Haywharf, Floriana, where they were received by an Immigration Police contingent, led by Inspector Sandro Zard, and a medical-response team who ascertained the migrants’ state of health.

Later in morning, the Maritime Squadron's Vittoria-class Search-and-Rescue launch "Melita-1" brought to shore the corpse of a presumed male illegal migrant, which had been reported by a local fisherman at 9.53am to the AFM's operations centre of Luqa Barracks.

Initial efforts by the Bremse-class patrolboat P-32 proved difficult in the reported area of the corpse's location. However, shortly afterwards the Melita SAR-launch successfully found the corpse in a position just 2.5 miles off Wied iz-Zurrieq, in the proximity of Filfla. Initial indications showed that the corpse had been at sea for some six days, and documents showed the dead man was 37 years old.

A magisterial inquiry is underway, and police forensic technicians and the appointed court experts performed their initial investigations at Haywharf, before it was taken away by the Police hearse.