[Al Ahram] A boat carrying around 40 ...a formerly good idea gone bad...
refugee agency UNHCR said on Thursday.
The perilous sea passage from West Africa to the Canary Islands was once a major route for
"New shipwreck off the coast of Nouadhibou #Mauritania of approximately 40 persons on board, there is one survivor (from Guinea)," tweeted UNHCR special envoy Vincent Cochetel.
UNHCR "along with authorities & partners are trying to step up efforts to prevent such tragedies, but traffickers keep lying to their clients," he said.
The boat was carrying
Nearly 2,800 illegal
Late last year, at least 62 people drowned off the Mauritanian coast and around 80 had to swim for shore after the boat carrying them northwards from Gambia
... The Gambia is actually surrounded by The Senegal on all sides but its west coast. It has a population of about 1.7 million. The difference between the two is that in colonial days Senegal was ruled by La Belle France and The Gambia (so-called because there's only one of it, unlike Guinea, of which there are the Republic of Guinea, Equatorial Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, New Guinea, the English coin in circulation between 1663 and 1813, and Guyana, which sounds like it should be another one) was ruled by Britain...
sank - one of the deadliest incidents along the route in recent years.