More than 400 migrants and refugees have been rescued at sea by Moroccan authorities in several operations since Friday, military sources in Rabat said, adding that most of the ships were coming from Senegal.
According to the same sources quoted by the Spanish news agency Europe PressThe migrants reportedly wanted to reach the coast of the Canary Islands in Spain.
Moroccan authorities initially reported the location of two boats containing 288 migrants, most of whom were Senegalese citizens. The ships left the coast of Senegal on October 19 and 25 with a child on board, according to official news agency MAP.
On the other hand, on Friday the Royal Navy carried out a third intervention on a boat with 103 people, 94 of whom were Senegalese. At the same time, the migrants left Senegal on October 29 and among them were at least two minors.
This Saturday, the Navy discovered a fourth ship carrying 42 sub-Saharan migrants. Moreover, the boat departed not from Senegal, but from the capital of Mauritania, Nouakchott, on October 22.
The International Organization for Migration (IOM) estimates that about 200 people have died this year along the migration route linking West Africa to the Canary Islands. Since 2014, more than 770 people have died along this route.