64 migrants found dead in truck container in Mozambique

March 24 (UPI) -- Immigration officers in Mozambique have found the bodies of 64 migrants in a shipping container that was hauled by a truck that came from neighboring Malawi, officials said Tuesday.

The dead likely suffocated in the container, authorities said in the southeast African nation. The migrants were from Ethiopia.

Fourteen other migrants were still alive when the truck was searched in the western province of Tete, about 80 miles northeast of the Mozambique-Zimbabwe border. Immigration officials said they'd heard noises coming from inside the container.

A government spokesman said a preliminary investigation found the truck driver, a native Mozambican, had illegally entered the former Portuguese colony from Malawi.

The driver and another suspect were jailed, officials said.

Mozambique's national police and officials from Maputo's immigration, health and justice ministries are investigating the case.

More than three dozen migrants were found dead in similar circumstances in Britain last October.