A three-year-old Nigerian boy was among at least 17 migrants feared to have drowned when a packed dinghy foundered in the Mediterranean amid rough seas, coastguard said on Thursday.
The child was wearing a life-jacket when he and slipped from his mother's grasp after they ended up in the water, she told rescuers.
The toddler's mother was among 113 people rescued by the Malta-based Migrant Offshore Aid Station (Moas), the Italian Red Cross and other charities late on Wednesday after the dinghy started to fill with water.
Bad weather has hampered the search for survivors and the recovery of the corpses of victims, rescuers said.
Many survivors spent several hours in the water before they were picked up and suffered burns after their clothes became saturated with salt water and fuel oil, according to rescuers.
The dinghy set sale from the Libyan coastal city of Sabrata with an unknown number of passengers on board at around 2pm on Thursday, according to survivors.
The stricken vessel's location was pinpointed by a drone equipped with infra-red sensors.
A total of 175 migrants rescued in the Mediterranean in the past two days were due to arrive at the Sicilian port of Messina early on Friday, MOAS and the Italian Red Cross said.
Over 3,600 people are known to have died in the Mediterranean this year while around 316,330 to have reached Europe by sea, figures issued by the International Organisation for Migration showed on Sunday.
