On Friday, the Moroccan authorities recovered the bodies of 13 Moroccan immigrants, including a woman, after their boat sank off Mir El-Left in the south, local media reported.
The authorities were able to rescue 24 other migrants, including a minor, the Hespress news website said on Friday, citing sources who asked not to be identified in the southern coastal city of Mir El-Left.
The number of immigrants who died is expected to rise because there are still eight others missing.
The boat was carrying 45 people and was heading to the Spanish islands of Las Palmas in the Canary Islands archipelago. The migrants had paid amounts ranging between 20,000 and 25,000 dirhams (between 2,000 and 2,200 dollars), according to the news site.
The Moroccan authorities did not confirm the drowning incident, according to what was reported by Agence France-Presse.
The 2M news website stated that “as soon as the boat entered the Atlantic waters at the level of Aimi Netreka Beach (…) it suffered damage and lost air, so the victims found themselves in the middle of the waves.”
And the Hespress website indicated that the boat “overturned less than ten minutes after its launch, due to a collision with rocks.”
Morocco, located in the northwestern tip of Africa, is a transit country for many migrants, especially from sub-Saharan Africa, seeking to reach Europe via its Atlantic or Mediterranean coasts.
According to a report by the Spanish NGO Caminando Fronteras, at least 11,200 migrants have died or gone missing since 2018 while trying to cross into Spain, an average of six people per day.
The organization indicated that the road alone between the northwest coast of Africa and the Canary Islands witnessed the deaths of 7,692 migrants.
As of the end of 2019, the number of migrants attempting to cross illegally via the perilous migration route across the Atlantic has risen as patrols in the Mediterranean have intensified.
Since the beginning of 2022, 27,789 illegal immigrants have managed to reach Spain (15,742 of them in the Canary Islands), according to figures released by the Spanish Ministry of the Interior as of December 15.
In a related context, the Libyan Coast Guard said that a ship carrying at least 700 migrants was intercepted off the eastern coast of Libya.
This is one of the largest interceptions in recent months of migrants seeking a better life in Europe via the war-torn North African country, according to the Associated Press.
The coast guard said the boat was stopped on Friday off the Mediterranean town of Mora, 90 km west of the eastern city of Benghazi.
It said in a statement that the migrants come from different countries and that those who entered Libya illegally will be extradited to their countries of origin.
The statement did not give further details.
The Coast Guard posted photos on Facebook showing a large, overcrowded ship, with most of the people on board appearing to be young men.
And in August last year, Italian military ships helped a boat packed with 539 migrants off the southern island of Lampedusa. The boat set off from the Libyan shores.