• Police say 3 drown, 5 missing in India while taking selfies, videos

The population of European Union increased to almost 512 million people mainly due to migration to the bloc, according to an estimate published by the EU’s Statistical Office, Eurostat, on Monday in Brussels.

Eurostat said that on January 1, 2017, the population of the EU was estimated at 511.8 million, compared with 510.3 million in 2016.

Since the number of recorded births and deaths were equal in 2016, the increase of 1.5 million more inhabitants was attributed to migration.

With 82.8 million residents, Germany is the most populous EU member state, ahead of France (67 million) and Britain (65.8 million.)

The largest population increases were reported in Luxemburg, Sweden and Malta, while Lithuania, Latvia and Croatia witnessed the largest decrease.

About 5.1 million babies were born in the EU in 2016.

The highest birth rates were registered in Ireland, Sweden and Britain, while Italy, Portugal and Greece have the lowest birth rates in the bloc.

In the meantime, police on Monday said three men died and five remain missing after their boat capsised in a river in central India while they were taking selfies and videos for social media.

The police said the accident occurred on Sunday evening when a group of 10 men, between 21 and 28 years, were out on a fishing boat on the Vena river near the city of Nagpur.

Area police chief Chandrashekhar Bahadure said the boatman rescued two men and three bodies were fished out Monday afternoon.

“During initial investigations, we found that the group was busy taking videos and selfies on the boat that is suspected to have caused the tragedy,” Bahadure said.

“Survivors say the boat lost balance and overturned when a number of men came to one side to pose for either selfies or videos.

“The men had also posted a video on Facebook minutes before the boat tipped over,” he said.

Police said divers and national disaster response force personnel were assisting in the rescue but it was unlikely there would be survivors.

India has had the highest number of selfie-related deaths, according to new research.

A study by Carnegie Mellon University found that between March 2014 and September 2016, 60 per cent of the 127 “selfie deaths” across the world, occurred in India.

In 2016, police in Mumbai created 16 “no-selfie zones” after a university student fell into the sea and drowned while taking a photo of herself with her phone.