Spain coast guard spots boat during search for missing migrant vessel

The Spanish coast guard has located a boat carrying around 200 migrants that went missing over a week ago. The boat was found 71 miles south of Gran Canaria, and a coast guard vessel has been dispatched for rescue operations.

The fishing boat had departed from a coastal town in southern Senegal, approximately 1,700km away from Tenerife, with 200 people on board, including many children. Two other similar boats carrying additional migrants are also reported missing, with limited information available. This brings the total number of people missing across the three boats to over 300.

The route from West Africa to the Canary Islands is known to be perilous, and last year alone, at least 559 people died attempting to reach the Spanish islands. The exact number of departures and shipwrecks often goes unreported. The migrants attempting this route typically come from countries such as Morocco, Mali, Senegal, the Ivory Coast, and other sub-Saharan nations.

Despite a decrease in the number of unauthorized arrivals in the Canary Islands in 2022 compared to the previous year, the route remains dangerous, and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) emphasizes that the flows are still high compared to previous years.

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