A private rescue boat carrying 113 migrants saved from dying in the Mediterranean has been granted permission to dock in the Italian port of Ravenna, located some 1,700 kilometres away from its current location.

Migrant rescue organization SOS Mediterranee, which operates the Ocean Viking ship, estimated that it will take the vessel about "four long days" to reach Ravenna in the north-east corner of Italy on the Adriatic coast, it tweeted on Tuesday (December 27).

Italian authorities had initially provided the charity ship the Ligurian port city of La Spezia as a "distant Place of Safety," urging Ocean Viking to proceed to the location.

A few hours later, however, the Italian Rescue Coordination Center (ITMRCC) reassigned the even further port of Ravenna.

The rescue operation

The Ocean Viking crew had rescued the 113 migrants from an overcrowded dinghy "in pitch dark" the evening before, the organization said in a separate tweet. Among the migrants rescued were 23 women – some of them pregnant – as well as some 30 unaccompanied children and three babies.

"We are relieved for the survivors onboard but we are also concerned about the other potential boats in distress in the central Mediterranean," SOS Mediterranee said, noting that it was currently the only aid organization operating a rescue ship in the area.

"While we are heading North, we fear that lives may still be at stake at sea."

Read more: Italy: Underage migrants helped provide Christmas meals for the poor in Caserta

Italy cracks down on immigration

Italy's new right-wing coalition government led by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni is strictly opposed to immigration.

According to media reports, the government is planning to adopt a new set of rules regarding the civil rescue ships operating in the Mediterranean Sea.

Ships operated by charities and NGOs often face harassment from port authorities and coast guards. 

In November, Italy forbade the Ocean Viking to dock in one of its ports, forcing the charity ship to continue on to France – adding strain to Rome-Paris relations.

The Mediterranean Sea is one of the busiest migrant routes in the world, with people fleeing war and poverty making dangerous, and often deadly, sea crossing into Europe.

The UN's International Organization for Migration (IOM) has recorded around 2,000 people who have died or gone missing in the Mediterranean this year alone.

The real number is likely to be much higher, as many such cases go unreported.

with DPA and Reuters