The first two weeks of 2025 have already left one of the worst shipwrecks recorded on the Canary Islands route in recent months. A canoe with 86 people on board sank this Thursday off the coast of Western Sahara. The tragedy resulted in the death of 50 people and 36 survivors, helped by the Moroccan authorities. The boat had left Mauritania on January 2 and its occupants spent “13 days of agonizing journey” without rescue arriving.
Unlike other shipwrecks recorded in the Atlantic, in this case the majority of the victims were Pakistani nationals. Of the 66 Pakistanis who left on that boat, only 22 were rescued alive. As this newspaper has learned, at least 12 of the deceased migrants were from the city of Gujrat, in the north of the country.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Government of Pakistan has reported in an official statement that several survivors are staying in a camp near Dakhla, in Western Sahara. The Pakistani Embassy in Rabat has sent a team to the Sahrawi city to provide assistance to migrants from their country.
Ahmed Sardar, spokesperson for Pak Federación España, the organization that brings together all entities of the Pakistani community, insists that there are many families worried about not knowing if their loved ones are alive or dead. ”They don’t know if their parents and siblings were on that boat or if they are waiting to get on one,” he points out in statements offered to this editorial team.
”We are very sad about the news, but what worries us even more is that there are more and more people on that route,” laments Sardar. The presence of Asians on the Canary Islands route began to increase in the last months of 2024. The increased border control in the Mediterranean, added to political instability, violence and the impact of climate change, has pushed people from Pakistan, Yemen, Bangladesh , Afghanistan and Syria to the most lethal route in the world.
According to the latest Frontex data consulted by this newspaper, between January and November of last year, 221 Pakistanis, 13 Syrians, eight nationals from Yemen, 12 from Afghanistan and 54 from Bangladesh arrived in the Canary Islands. These figures increased in December. Asian people are traveling on many of the boats rescued near the islands. On December 17, a canoe surprised the emergency services in El Hierro by taking a majority of Pakistanis on board. Of the 75 people who were rescued, 53 were of this nationality. This is something unusual on the route, starring people from Senegal and Mali.
The association’s spokesperson insists that Pakistani migrants leave their country deceived by the ”false promises of the mafias”. ”The people who come have no idea that they will go through this. If not, they wouldn’t risk their lives,” he says.
”They promise you a fast, safe and legal path. They promise them that when they arrive in Europe they will get papers and a job. Young people see there the opportunity to change their lives, but this journey, as we have just seen, can be deadly,” Sardar emphasizes. The spokesperson adds that many migrants sell all their property to be able to undertake this trip. In other cases, they do it thanks to loans requested by their relatives, believing that they will be able to pay it back quickly when they arrive in Europe.
From Pak Spanish Federation they ask governments, the media and NGOs to coordinate to raise awareness among young people and to let them know that “everything the mafias promise them is false.” ”Let this reach every last person in Pakistan,” asks Sardar.
The Mauritanian route
An average of 28 people a day lost their lives trying to reach the Canary Islands in 2024. Last year it resulted in the death of at least 9,757 migrants in the Atlantic. Of all the crossings that connect the Archipelago with West Africa, the one that connects Mauritania with El Hierro and Tenerife was the most lethal, registering 6,829 deaths, according to data published in the last Monitoring the Right to Life prepared by the Caminando Fronteras collective.
These fiber canoes travel mostly with people in transit escaping war conflicts in the Sahel, climate change, labor exploitation or gender violence.
More and more children and adolescents are taking this route, in which there has also been an increase in women. ”These women come from very impoverished areas, and a large number are forced to work in conditions of slavery in Mauritania to be able to pay for the trip,” the study details.
In March 2024, the European Union announced an allocation of 210 million euros to stop emigration to the Canary Islands. ”Despite all the money invested, there is no impact on the protection of human rights as indicated by the terrible numbers of victims that this migratory route presents,” says Caminando Fronteras.
Source: www.eldiario.es
