Senegal’s Interior Ministry announced the recovery of 21 bodies after a boat carrying migrants and refugees sank off the country’s northwestern coast. One person was rescued and search operations continued. The ministry described its figures as provisional, as families awaited news of a disaster near the Loumpoul dunes in the Kebemer department.
A boat carrying migrants and refugees sank off Senegal’s northwestern coast. The Interior Ministry said on 8 November that one person had been found alive and teams were continuing the search for other survivors. It reported 21 recovered bodies, describing the count as provisional as of Saturday evening. Assistance was being provided to the victims’ families while the operation continued.[1], [2]
The flat-bottomed vessel, known as a pirogue, capsized on Saturday off the Loumpoul dunes, according to media accounts. The site is in Senegal’s Kebemer department, between Dakar and Saint-Louis, a city in the north of the country. Senegalese newspaper Le Soleil said most of the victims came from Leona and Thieppe, two areas within the same department.[1]
People travelling from West Africa attempt the sea crossing to Spain’s Canary Islands, and thousands have died on that journey in recent years. Migrant rights organisation Walking Borders put deaths on the route at 635 during the first five months of this year. The organisation’s figure concerns that earlier period across the route; the Senegalese ministry’s announcement concerns the ongoing operation off Kebemer.[1]
