The Moroccan navy said it intercepted 141 people trying to cross the Atlantic Ocean, as migration from West Africa to Spain’s Canary Islands spiked since the start of the year.
Morocco ‘s royal armed forces said in a statement Sunday that they were able to rescue all passengers from a boat off the coast of Western Sahara , a disputed territory with a coastline that Morocco has controlled since 1975.
The 141 people were all from sub-Saharan Africa and had likely boarded more than a week earlier in Mauritania, Morocco’s southern neighbor and the main departure point for migrants trying to reach Spain’s Canary Islands.
This interception is the largest that Moroccan authorities have reported this year.
The Canary Islands are about 100 km from Morocco’s Atlantic coast, but pirogues – the wooden boats that migrants often use to cross – often depart from as far south as the Gambia, from where the journey can last up to 10 days, according to the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime.
The Spanish Interior Ministry said 11,704 migrants had arrived in the Canaries as of February 15, six times more than a year earlier. The majority of them left from Mauritania, which recently signed a 210 million euro agreement with the European Union, providing funding for migration patrols and humanitarian aid.
