Fifteen people have died and over 150 are missing after a boat carrying 300 passengers capsized near Mauritania’s capital, Nouakchott, on Monday.
This was disclosed according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM). The boat was traveling along the Atlantic migration route from West Africa to the Canary Islands, a notoriously deadly passage used by African migrants attempting to reach Spain. This route is especially busy during the summer months.
The Mauritanian coastguard rescued 120 people, with 10 taken to hospitals, while efforts to locate the missing continued. The passengers were traveling from Gambia and had been at sea for seven days before the shipwreck.
Ibba Sarr, a fishmonger in Nouakchott, reported that strong winds over the past two days had moved the bodies closer to shore. He saw around 30 bodies being collected from the beach and expects more to be discovered in the coming days. The capsized boat was located 400 meters north of the fish market.
Mauritanian authorities did not respond to reporters’ requests for comment. The IOM reported that more than 19,700 migrants reached the Canary Islands via the Atlantic route between January 1st and July 15th, 2024, a 160% increase compared to the same period in 2023.
In a related statistic, migration rights group, Walking Borders reported in June that nearly 5,000 migrants died at sea in the first five months of 2024 while attempting to reach the Spanish archipelago.
