Daily Times

Moroccan navy forces have recovered the bodies of five migrants, all from Senegal, and rescued 189 others after their boat capsized off Western Sahara, a military source told state media Monday. The five bodies as well as 11 migrants in “critical condition” were transferred to a hospital in Dakhla, the disputed Western Sahara’s second city on the Atlantic coast, the source told Rabat’s MAP news agency. According to the source, the boat had embarked from “a country located south of the kingdom” and was headed towards Spain’s Canary Islands before being discovered off the coast of Guerguart, just north of Mauritania. It was in a “difficult situation”, the source added. The migrants who were rescued, including at least one woman, were taken to Dakhla on Sunday and handed over to Moroccan authorities, according to the source. At least 13 Senegalese migrants died in mid-July when their boat sank off the Moroccan shore. On July 25, the Moroccan Association for Human Rights (AMDH) said five Moroccan migrants had died in a shipwreck off Western Sahara. The clandestine migration route to the Canaries has seen a surge in attempted sea crossings from northwestern Africa in recent weeks.