Fifteen migrants drowned, over 100 lost at sea

28 August 2006

TENERIFE — The bodies of 15 people found washed ashore on the beaches of Mauritania’s capital city are believed to be those of African migrants who were trying to reach the Canary Islands by boat, police said on Monday.

More than 100 others are thought to have disappeared in a boat which capsized off the West African coast.

In the first 21 days of August, more than 4,800 immigrants, mainly from sub-Saharan Africa, have landed in the Canary Islands, officials say.

Scores have also drowned. 

Altogether, over 18,000 have arrived this year dwarfing numbers for 2005, interior ministry officials said.

Hundreds of African migrants are reported to have died this year while trying to cross the Atlantic to the Canaries in fragile, barely seaworthy boats.

[Copyright EFE with Expatica]

Subject: Spanish news