Migrant Boat Capsizes Off Senegal, Killing at Least 21

At least 21 people died when a small boat carrying migrants and refugees capsized off northwestern Senegal, the Senegalese Interior Ministry said in a statement on Sunday. One person was rescued, and the ministry said the count was still "provisional" as of late Saturday. Search operations continued, and authorities said they were assisting the victims' families.

The boat was a pirogue, the flat-bottomed wooden vessel common along this coast, and it went down on Saturday near the Loumpoul dunes in the Kebemer department, according to media reports. That stretch of shoreline sits between the capital, Dakar, and the northern city of Saint-Louis. Le Soleil newspaper reported that most of those killed came from the Leona and Thieppe districts in the same department.

The route the boat was on is one of the deadliest in the world. Thousands of people have died in recent years trying to reach Spain's Canary Islands from West Africa, including 635 in the first five months of this year alone, according to the migrant rights group Walking Borders.

The pressure is not easing on the other side of the water. Spanish authorities on the Canary Island of El Hierro declared an emergency on Saturday after a spike in migrant boat arrivals — more than 3,300 people have reached the island aboard roughly 30 boats since the start of November.

Senegal's Interior Ministry gave no figure for how many people were believed to be aboard when the pirogue went down, and the death toll could still rise as the search continues. For now, one survivor, 21 confirmed dead, and families waiting for answers.