2,000 migrants land at Italy island

Almost 2,000 people arrived by boat on the Italian island of Lampedusa from Libya and Tunisia over the weekend, the UN refugee agency has said.

A spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees said about 1,800 of the arrivals set sail from Janzour outside the Libyan capital Tripoli.

Adrian Edwards said the group included migrants from other African countries and there were 200 women and 30 children.

Edwards told reporters in Geneva that a group of Sudanese men claimed to have been rounded up in Tripoli and forced to board the boat.

He says 52,000 people have arrived in Italy from North Africa since the start of the year. Slightly over half of those departed from Libya, though the number of Libyan nationals among the arrivals is small.