Probable death toll in migrant boat sinking raised to 64

As many as 64 people are feared dead after a smugglers' rubber dinghy sank in the Mediterranean Sea off Libya, according to the UN's migration agency.

Hours after the boat started sinking on Saturday due to a puncture, the Italian coast guard rescued 86 people and retrieved the bodies of eight dead women.

Flavio Di Giacomo of the UN's International Organisation for Migration said that there were 150 people on board, according to survivors interviewed by the agency in Sicily after they arrived on a rescue ship.

Rescue agencies had expressed fears shortly after the tragedy that dozens of people could be missing.

The Italian coast guard launched a search but did not find any more survivors or bodies.