A representative of the Eritrean Liberation Front has told The Malta Independent on Sunday that the boatload of 53 migrants lost at sea 14 days ago and feared dead, are alive and in detention in Libya.

A member of the group of missing migrants has been contacted, as has the Libyan detention camp where they are being detained.

Both have confirmed the group was the one last seen and photographed by an Armed Forces of Malta aircraft on 21 May. Passengers had said the engine had broken down and they were seen using a jerry can to bail water out of their sinking, overcrowded, fibreglass boat.

The vessel later appeared to have vanished into thin air and with subsequent Maltese and Italian searches having proved futile, the group, thought to include women and children, was feared dead.

Speaking to The Malta Independent on Sunday, the representative of Eritrean Liberation Front in France Tesfay Teklezghi confirmed he has spoken with both a member of the group as well as a detention camp official. Both informed him the group was indeed Eritrean and that they were the same group that had been feared dead.

The group had known they had been spotted and thought at one point to have been on the verge of being rescued when it was overflown by an AFM aircraft for hours. The plane had been compelled to return to base to refuel while a patrol boat was en route to the distressed vessel.

When the plane returned to the location, however, the vessel was nowhere to be found.

Estimates of the exact numbers on board had varied from between 50 to 59. While Mr Teklezghi, could not confirm how many migrants were originally on board, he was able to ascertain through two short phone calls with the detention camp that the group in Libyan detention numbered 52. When pressed for further information, prison officials, Mr Teklezghi said, hung up the phone.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, which said the group comprised 28 women and six children, confirmed on Friday that it had also received indications that the group may be in Libya.

The UNHCR added that is in contact with the Libyan authorities in the hope of locating the group, but has been unsuccessful so far.

The sister of a detained migrant had contacted Mr Teklezghi on 25 May with information that the group was alive and being held in a Libyan detention camp in the vicinity of Tripoli. He was also that informed the group had been in Libya for the last three days.

The timeframe would place the migrants’ pick up, presumably from Libyan waters, on 21 or 22 May.

If the reports are correct, Libya would have had the migrants in custody while search efforts were still underway by at least Malta and Italy, while the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees was busy urging countries to step up their search efforts.

Although the AFM had searched for the vessel up to 88 miles south of Malta, within its own search and rescue zone, no sign of the vessel had been found.

The circumstances leading to the migrants’ return to Libyan shores are unclear, but the vessel, presumably in Libyan waters, could have been intercepted by the Libyan authorities or perhaps by passing Libyan fishermen.

There has been speculation that the corpses collected by the French navy on Friday could have been some of those missing on 21 May or some of the 30 companions of the sole survivor rescued on 18 May. Eventual autopsies, in Malta or Libya depending on where the corpses are eventually landed, will possibly reveal the accurate time of death.

Mr Teklezghi is certain the migrants in Libyan detention will be repatriated to Eritrea where, he says, “there lives will be at great risk”, as past experience has shown time and time again. Such was the case of the migrants repatriated to Eritrea, many to horrific fates, by Malta in 2002.

He called on governments, the UNHCR, Amnesty International and other human rights organisations as well as the European Union to urge Libya not to repatriate the migrants.

“The Eritreans are suffering in all political, economic and social domains under the dictatorial regime since independence in 1993. There is no peace, democracy or respect for basic human rights. Nor are there elections, constitutional law, independent political parties or press freedoms.

“In Eritrea there are only the guns and terror against its own people. The world must address these basic issues, and then issues of migration and asylums could also be solved.

“The people don’t want to leave their country and relatives, and wouldn’t have to if it wasn’t for the dictatorial regime that is in place.”