21 Dead in Shipwreck Off Haiti Coast: Official

Twenty-one migrants died after their boat sank off the north coast of Haiti, a senior official said Thursday.

A senior official at Haiti's civil protection directorate said those on board the ship had been trying to reach Providenciales Island in the neighboring Turks and Caicos.

The ship -- which left at about midnight -- had attempted to return after running into bad weather but sank off the coast in the early hours of Thursday, said the official, Alta Jean-Baptiste.

The 21 bodies were found on the shore in the town of Borgne, west of Cap-Haitien, the Caribbean country's second-largest city.

Authorities said there were survivors, but they were unable to immediately give a precise figure.

In Haiti, an impoverished country where more than 70 per cent of the population lives on less than $2 a day, residents regularly attempt to illegally reach Turks and Caicos or the Bahamas.

Haitian authorities have tried to put a stop to the flow of illegal migrants, but soaring unemployment has led many Haitians, notably the young, to try to build a future elsewhere.