More Than 60 Migrants Drown Off Mauritania’s Coast

An overcrowded vessel carries migrants to Europe in 2016. (Wikimedia Commons)

Sixty-two migrants died off the coast of Mauritania after their vessel capsized on December 5, marking the greatest loss of life in clandestine migration along the western route of Africa this year. The boat was carrying at least 150 migrants before it sank.

According to a Mauritanian official, the vessel sank after running into a rock and taking on water. As the crowded boat capsized, passengers began jumping off the vessel and swimming toward land. A total of 83 people, including more than a dozen children, managed to reach the shore of Mauritania after a 15-mile swim.

Mauritania’s interior minister reported that the survivors are receiving treatment at a hospital in the city of Nouadhibou. A doctor there stated that upon their arrival, the surviving migrants were “exhausted, starving, their morale at zero.” At least ten survivors are in urgent condition.

The ship initially left The Gambia on November 27 and was bound for the Spanish Canary Islands before being diverted to Mauritania due to low fuel supplies. The majority of the migrants were Gambian while a handful hailed from neighboring Senegal.

In the past 20 years, The Gambia has faced a spike of emigration as thousands of young Gambians flee the country’s worsening economic conditions. Many have left to escape the rule of former-President Yahya Jammeh, whose authoritarian administration severely damaged the country’s economy. Although Jammeh lost power in 2017, The Gambia continues to suffer economically as the country now faces a drop in tourism following the collapse of a major British travel agency operating in the region.

 Government response has been limited from The Gambia in the wake of the accident. Gambian President Adama Barrow “expressed great sadness” in an official statement, and Mauritanian officials have reached out to the Gambian ambassador since taking in the survivors. Meanwhile, the chairman of The Gambia’s National Youth Council gave an impassioned statement calling for an investigation into human trafficking in the region. He stated that the “government must take deliberate measures to crack down on smugglers and traffickers profiting from these criminal operation.”

Smuggling regulations may change following this tragedy. The incident is only one of many in a long string of migrant drownings that have led to 158 deaths this year. No major reforms have been announced thus far.