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Seven Africans found dead on Spanish coast
AFP
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
MADRID, Spain (AFP) - The bodies of seven African migrants were found at a beach in southern Spain yesterday and emergency services were searching for possible survivors from a small boat which ran aground, Spanish media said.
Two men and two women, thought to be of Moroccan nationality, were found dead early yesterday near the port of Cadiz, said a spokesman for the local authority.
The bodies of three more migrants, all men, were found later in the day, the newspaper El Mundo said on its website.
It said emergency services had rescued 10 people, four of them children, after the small open boat they were on sank near the Trafalgar lighthouse, 25 miles from Cadiz.
Between 30 to 40 people could have been aboard the wooden boat and a rescue operation involving the Red Cross and the police was continuing late Monday, El Mundo said.
Spain has been a magnet for years for African migrants aspiring to reach Europe.
Authorities fear many of the thousands of Africans who make the perilous journey towards Spanish soil in simple boats die of thirst, hunger or exposure, but there is no way of knowing exactly how many have perished.
A record 31,678 people from sub-Saharan Africa reached Spain's Canary Islands in 2006 on small boats from Africa, but the figure dropped to 1,318 in the first quarter of 2009.
In February, the sinking of a boat off the Canaries killed 25 people, including 19 children.
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