Italian prosecutors said they detained Francesco Schettino, the captain of the luxury ship cruiser that ran aground near the coast of Tuscany late Friday, Italian media reported.
Schettino was questioned for several hours before being taken to a pretrial detention facility. He said that the Costa Concordia liner with over 4,200 passengers on board hit reefs that were not marked on the navigation map.
The captain of the ill-fated ship is suspected of manslaughter and leaving the ship in distress before the evacuation was over.
The liner ran aground off the Isola del Giglio island. At least three people - two French passengers and a crewmember from Peru - were killed and 67 were injured. About 70 passengers are still listed as missing.
A criminal investigation was launched to investigate the shipwreck and fatalities.
The liner carried about 108 Russians, all of them were rescued and taken to hotels.
“Costa Cruises said it would pay all expenses of providing people with warm clothes, food and accommodation,” said Natalya Andronova, the head of a travel agency which organized Costa Concordia cruise for about 20 tourists from Russia.
“The company management assured us that it would pay for sending all tourists home, including Russians,” she added.
