A ferry boat trying to land at a Niger River town in the Timbuktu region of northern Mali hit rocks and sank in an accident that left dozens of people dead, local officials and relatives of the dead said Tuesday. The accident took place Thursday at the town of Diré, officials said. Local authorities had not yet released an official death toll, but regional resident and former National Assembly deputy Alkaidi Touré said Tuesday that 38 were killed and 23 survived.For all the latest headlines, follow our Google News channel online or via the app.Diré resident Moussa Ag Almoubarek Traoré said he lost 21 family member in the accident, and that he helped retrieve and tally the dead with local officials. “I collected the bodies that were scattered across the river, and some were already decomposing. As I speak to you now, I can still smell the bodies,” Traoré said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press. The boat was carrying families and farmers who had just harvested rice,