[WATCH] Updated | 99 migrants rescued at sea and disembarked in Malta

The migrants from aboard the Sea-Watch 3 have disembarked in Malta on Saturday afternoon

99 migrants have been rescued in Maltese waters at around 12:45pm, an Armed Forces of Malta spokesperson told MaltaToday. 

The migrants remain aboard the Sea-Watch 3, the German-run private rescue vessel. On Friday, the same vessel said on Twitter that 42 migrants were rescued from a boat in distress in the Maltese rescue zone at 4am. 

It took us 8 hours to arrive at the scene, where we started to hand out life vests to everyone. The passengers who had been at sea for days told us they had seen two ships passing & ignoring them. We realized there was an Armed Forces Malta ship standing by for 3 hours already. pic.twitter.com/LX9uJFLzSD

— Sea-Watch International (@seawatch_intl) January 11, 2020

The rescue team said that the passengers had been at sea for days and told the crew that they had been seeing ships passing by their vessel but ignoring them.

"We realised there was an Armed Forces Malta ship standing by for three hours already," they said.