DAKAR: A boat carrying nearly a hundred migrants hoping to reach Europe from Senegal ran aground on Tuesday morning in the capital city of Dakar, according to local authorities.
The migrants were likely aiming to sail another 1,500 kilometers (about 937 miles) across the Atlantic Ocean to Spain’s Canary Islands, which has reemerged as a major migrant transit route since 2020.
Nearly 47,000 people disembarked in the Canaries in 2024, an increase from the nearly 40,000 in 2023, according to Spanish Interior Ministry figures. Many undertake the journey in large, open top boats known as pirogues.
“We were informed of the interception of a pirogue full of migrants who wanted to leave for Europe,” said Abdou Aziz Guèye, mayor of Ouakam, the neighborhood where the boat ran aground.
The pirogue was first spotted by fishermen who lent the occupants an engine, as they no longer had one, said Guèye.
“It is a distressing sight. The captain reportedly fled with the engine,” Guèye said.
Although the canoe landed in Ouakam, its journey did not originate there, the mayor said.
When the boat arrived local police set up a temporary processing center to conduct identity checks on the passengers.
The Atlantic crossing is one of the deadliest in the world. While there is no accurate death toll because of the lack of information on departures from West Africa, the Spanish migrant rights group Walking Borders estimates the victims are in the thousands this year alone.
“Illegal emigration is not over. It’s a phenomenon that continues,” said Guèye, who cautioned migrants from making the risky journey.
While most migrants leaving Senegal are young men, aid workers in the Canary Islands say they are increasingly seeing women and children risk their lives as well.
Last year, the EU signed a 210 million euro deal with Mauritania to stop smugglers from launching boats to Spain. But statistics show trans-Atlantic migration from West Africa has continued, even as irregular border crossings in Europe have been falling steadily.
In Senegal, winter sees an increase in attempted journeys as the seasonal change lowers the intensity of waves. However, migrants still choose to take the risk throughout the year.
Boat with over 100 migrants runs aground in Dakar, Senegal
https://arab.news/ybat5
Boat with over 100 migrants runs aground in Dakar, Senegal
- The migrants were likely aiming to sail another 1,500 kilometers across the Atlantic Ocean to Spain’s Canary Islands
- Although the canoe landed in Ouakam, its journey did not originate there, the mayor said
Bolivia and Israel to restore ties severed over the war in Gaza
- Paz's government eased visa restrictions on American and Israeli travelers last month
- The Bolivian foreign ministry said its top diplomat would meet his Israeli counterpart in Washington later Tuesday to discuss the revival of bilateral ties
LA PAZ, Bolivia: Bolivia's new right-wing government said Tuesday that it would restore diplomatic relations with Israel, the latest sign of the dramatic geopolitical realignment underway in the South American country that was once among the most vocal critics of Israeli policies toward Palestinians.
The Bolivian foreign ministry said its top diplomat would meet his Israeli counterpart in Washington later Tuesday to discuss the revival of bilateral ties, which Bolivia's previous left-wing government severed two years ago over Israel's devastating campaign against Hamas in Gaza.
Bolivia said the effort came as part of a new foreign policy strategy under conservative President Rodrigo Paz aimed at “rebuilding Bolivia's international prestige, opening new economic opportunities and strengthening alliances that directly benefit the country and our citizens abroad."
Bolivian Foreign Minister Fernando Aramayo is in the midst of a whirlwind trip to Washington for meetings with American officials as his government works to warm long-chilly relations with the United States and unravel nearly two decades of hard-line, anti-Western policies under the Movement Toward Socialism, or MAS, party that left Bolivia economically isolated and diplomatically allied with China, Russia and Venezuela.
Paz's government eased visa restrictions on American and Israeli travelers last month.
In announcing his expected meeting with Aramayo on Monday, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar thanked Bolivia for scrapping Israeli visa controls and said he spoke to Paz after the center-right senator's Oct. 19 election victory to express “Israel’s desire to open a new chapter” in relations with Bolivia.
Paz entered office last month, ending the dominance of the MAS party founded by Evo Morales, the charismatic former coca-growing union leader who became Bolivia's first Indigenous president in 2006. Not long after taking power, Morales sent Israel's ambassador packing and cozied up to Iran over their shared enmity toward the U.S. and Israel.
When protests over Morales' disputed 2019 reelection prompted him to resign under pressure from the military, a right-wing interim government took over and restored full diplomatic relations with the U.S. and Israel as it sought to undo many of Morales’ popular policies.
But 2020 elections brought the MAS party back to power with the presidency of Luis Arce, who in 2023 once again cut ties with Israel in protest over its military actions in Gaza.
Other left-wing Latin American countries, like Chile and Colombia, soon made similar moves, recalling their ambassadors and joining South Africa’s genocide case against Israel before the United Nations’ highest judicial body.
