Senegal intercepts boats carrying 262 migrants

Published October 2, 2023
Dozens of people on a Senegal Navy patrol boat. — X/MarineNation_SN
Dozens of people on a Senegal Navy patrol boat. — X/MarineNation_SN

SAINT LOUIS: The Senegalese Navy said on Sunday it had stopped two more boats carrying 262 would-be migrants late the previous night, taking the total to five boats intercepted and over 600 people rescued by a navy patrol boat since Thursday.

Those rescued included 26 women and 13 minors, the navy said in a post on social media platform X, sharing photos of dozens of people on a patrol boat and others seated in rows on a quay.

The successive rescues comes during the busy summer season when thousands of migrants brave the hundreds of miles of ocean separating Africa from Europe each year in a desperate search for a better life.

In August, only 37 survived after a migrant boat carrying 101 people from Senegal was found to have been adrift in the ocean without fuel for weeks.

From Senegal, they leave fishing villages and towns along the country’s Atlantic shorelines in brightly painted fishing vessels for the open ocean, overloaded with people with no shelter from the elements.

Another fishing boat on Saturday carrying more than a hundred people from the south of the country ran aground in the coastal city of Saint Louis when it was forced to turn around by high winds, witnesses said.

Videos shared on X sho­w­ed the boat being tossed by waves close to a beach as dozens of would-be migrants jump off and try to swim ashore.

Published in Dawn, October 2nd, 2023

Opinion

One year on

One year on

Governance by the ruling coalition has been underwhelming and marked by growing authoritarianism.

Editorial

Climate funding gap
Updated 17 Feb, 2025

Climate funding gap

Pakistan must boost its institutional capacity to develop bankable climate projects.
UN monitoring report
17 Feb, 2025

UN monitoring report

THE latest report of the UN Security Council’s sanctions monitoring team paints a grim picture of the banned...
Tax policy reform
17 Feb, 2025

Tax policy reform

THE cabinet’s decision to create a Tax Policy Office at the finance ministry has raised hopes that tax policy is...
Maintaining balance
Updated 16 Feb, 2025

Maintaining balance

It must take a more proactive approach to establishing Pakistan’s bona fides.
Welcome return
16 Feb, 2025

Welcome return

IT is almost here; the moment Pakistan has long been waiting for — the first International Cricket Council...
Childhood trauma
16 Feb, 2025

Childhood trauma

BEING a child in this society should not be so hard. But recurrent reports of child abuse — from burying girl...