Migrant girl and mother reunited by chance

A lost four-year-old migrant girl, who travelled alone from northern Africa to Italy, will be reunited with her mother after an extraordinary coincidence.

Oumoh's mother took her from her father's family in Ivory Coast to save her from female genital mutilation.

But the pair were separated when Oumoh's mother left her with a friend in Tunis to fetch things from home.

When the friend had an opportunity to travel to Italy, she took Oumoh with her but then left the girl alone.

Oumoh was rescued at sea and brought to the Italian island of Lampedusa, where none of the boat's other passengers knew who she was.

Police inspector Maria Volpe - known as "Mamma Maria" for her job looking after unaccompanied migrant children - went to the island to collect Oumoh.

She was traumatised and could not communicate with the staff, Marilena Cefala, the head of the centre told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. She was taken from the centre to a children's community in Palermo.

Then, days later, back at the reception centre on Lampedusa, a happy coincidence intervened.