At least 59 people died, including 12 children, when a wooden sailing boat carrying migrants to Europe crashed against rocks near the southern Italian coast early on Sunday, authorities said.

The vessel, which sailed from Turkey and was carrying people from Afghanistan, Iran and several other countries, sank in rough sea conditions near Steccato di Cutro, a seaside resort on the eastern coast of Calabria.

The incident reopened a debate on migration in Europe and Italy, where the recently-elected Right-wing government’s tough new laws for migrant rescue charities have drawn criticism from the United Nations and others.

By Sunday afternoon the provisional death toll stood at 59 but was expected to rise, junior interior minister Wanda Ferro told reporters.

Manuela Curra, a provincial government official, earlier told Reuters that 81 people had survived the shipwreck. Twenty of them were taken to hospital, including one person in intensive care.

The boat set sail from the western Turkish port of Izmir about four days ago and was spotted about 74km (46 miles) off the coast late on Saturday by a plane operated by European Union border agency Frontex, Italian police said.

Patrol boats were mobilised to intercept it, but severe weather forced them to return to port, police said, adding that authorities then mobilised search units along the coastline.

A baby aged only a few months was among the migrants first found washed up on the beach, according to ANSA news agency.

Emergency doctor Laura De Paoli described finding another dead child, aged seven.

“When we got to the point of the shipwreck we saw corpses floating everywhere and we rescued two men who were holding up a child. Sadly, the little one was dead,” she told ANSA.

Cutro’s mayor, Antonio Ceraso, told the SkyTG24 news channel that he had seen “a spectacle that you would never want to see in your life ... a gruesome sight ... that stays with you for all your life”.

Wreckage from the wooden gulet, a Turkish sailing boat, was strewn across a large stretch of coast.

One survivor was arrested on migrant trafficking charges, the Guardia di Finanza customs police said.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni expressed deep sorrow for the deaths, and blamed human traffickers who profit while offering migrants “the false prospect of a safe journey”.