Moscow (AFP) - At least 43 people have died and 26 others are still missing after a trawler sank off the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia's far east on Wednesday night, while 63 people were rescued alive, Russian media said.

"All in all 106 people have been taken aboard the ships participating in the rescue operation," an officer from the local maritime rescue coordination centre told Russian news agency TASS, adding that 43 of them had perished.