Record number of migrants, refugees reach Canary Islands by sea in 2024 Migration News

Spain received 63,970 migrants and asylum seekers last year, including 46,843 in the Canary Islands.

At least 46,843 people arrived in Spain’s Canary Islands in 2024 via the increasingly deadly Atlantic migration, the country’s interior ministry said.

The European country received 63,970 irregular migrants last year, the vast majority from the Atlantic archipelago, up from 56,852 in 2023, the ministry said Thursday.

EU border agency Frontex noted that irregular crossings into the bloc fell by 40 percent overall between January and November 2024, but rose by 19 percent on the Atlantic route, with people from Mali, Senegal and Morocco attempting to cross.

The impact of years of conflict, unemployment and climate change on farming communities in the Sahel region transition.

The Atlantic route, which includes departure points in Senegal, Gambia, Mauritania and Morocco, is also the deadliest in the world.

Last week at least 69 people, including 25 Malians died After a boat from West Africa to the Canary Islands sank near Morocco.

At least 10,457 migrants died or went missing trying to reach Spain by sea between January 1 and December 5, 2024, according to a report issued last month by the non-governmental organization Caminando Fronteras.

Caminando Fronteras added that this was a 50 percent increase from 2023 and the highest fee since it began in 2007, and attributed it to the number of wrecked boats, dangerous waters and a lack of resources for rescue.

Migrant aid group Walking Borders also blamed inaction or arbitrary rescues and the criminalization of migrants for the rise in deaths at sea. The aid group accused European governments of “prioritizing immigration control over the right to life”.