Morocco: Five bodies of migrants recovered off Western Sahara

DRAME The migrant boat had left illegally “from a country located south of the Kingdom”, trying to reach the Canary Islands

A migrant boat near Sfax, Tunisia, April 18, 2023. Illustration — STR/AP/SIPA

The Moroccan navy fished out five bodies of migrants, all Senegalese, and carried emergency 189 others whose boat capsized Saturday off Guerguerat, in Western Sahara, indicated a military source on Monday. The five lifeless bodies and 11 migrants in “critical condition” have been transferred to a hospital in Dakhla, Western Sahara, said a military source at; the Moroccan press agency MAP.

The migrant boat had left illegally “from a country south of the Kingdom”, trying to reach the Canary Islands (Spain), before being intercepted off Guerguart in “difficult situation” source me. The rescued migrants, including a woman, were sent to the port of Dakhla on Sunday, so that the Moroccan gendarmerie “can carry out the administrative procedures in force”, underlines the Moroccan military source.

The dangerous Canarian migration route

At least 13 migrants Senegalese died in mid-July in the sinking of their canoe off the Moroccan coast. The Moroccan Association for Human Rights (AMDH) has announced that on July 25 that five Moroccan migrants had found death in a shipwreck off the coast of Western Sahara.

The migratory route of the Canaries, gateway to Europe in the Atlantic Ocean, knows these recent weeks a clear revival of activities from the coasts of north-west Africa. Other attempts at crossings, just as perilous, are starting from the coasts of Morocco and Western Sahara.