Somalia — At least 25 people 23 of them Somalis died and 80 others injured in a car accident in the Sahara desert between Sudan and Libya, witnesses said on Thursday.

The people were all Somali and Ethiopian immigrants traveling illegally to Libya to migrate boats to Europe.

Many Somalis travel in the Sahara desert via Sudan and Libya to Europe. Their illegal boats capsize in the sea which brings disaster.

Hudeyfi Abdulle, one of the immigrants told Shabelle radio the car overturned three times and the driver was drunk.

The United Nations said Tuesday smugglers carrying a boatload of migrants forced their passengers to jump overboard in deep water off the coast of Yemen, causing up to 17 to drown,

The 52 Somali and Ethiopian passengers in one of seven boats crossing the Gulf of Aden were made to jump after the smugglers spotted police and refused to sail closer to shore, the U.N's refugee agency UNHCR said in a statement.

It said 35 people made it to land, six drowned and 11 others were missing presumed dead.

Almost 10,000 people have made the perilous journey across the Gulf of Aden to Yemen this year. Forty-seven people have died, with 23 bodies buried and 24 missing at sea, the UNHCR said.

Last year, more than 50,000 people crossed the gulf into Yemen.

Many are fleeing the war in Somalia, but recent months have seen an increase in the number of refugees from Ethiopia.