Spanish authorities and the relief organisation Walking Borders believe that dozens of people drowned after a migrant boat capsized Wednesday near Spain’s Canary Islands.
Two deaths, including a little boy, have been found by authorities, although it is unknown how many people were actually on board.
The founder of Walking Borders, Helena Maleno, told CNN that on Tuesday in the afternoon, her organisation received frantic calls from relatives of migrants on board reporting that the boat was drifting after running out of engine power. The group notified Spanish officials and asked for a rescue effort.
Spain’s Maritime rescue service tweeted Wednesday that two bodies were recovered from the sunken boat that had departed from Morocco. It added that a Moroccan patrol boat had rescued 24 others alive.
Maleno told CNN one of the bodies recovered was a 4-year-old boy, whose body has been taken to Spain. She added that her group believes 37 others on that same boat drowned, based on phone calls with relatives and with people aboard the boat before it sank.
A total of 5,914 migrants have arrived by boat to the Canary Islands this year through June 15, a 31% decline from the same period last year, Spain’s interior ministry recently reported.
Maleno said there has been a noticeable increase in recent weeks of attempted migrant crossings to the Canaries.
On Thursday, Spanish government maritime services rescued 227 other migrants from four boats off Lanzarote and Gran Canary islands on Thursday, which are part of the Canaries archipelago off Morocco’s west coast.
The incident raises further questions about Europe’s response to migration, after an overcrowded fishing trawler – carrying a reported 750 people – capsized off the coast of Greece last week, killing at least 82 people and leaving hundreds more missing.