WESTERN SAHARA: Western Sahara becomes the final stop for hundreds of illegal African migrants trying to reach Europe

African migrants headed for Europe are now trying to reach the Spanish Canary Islands via boat from the Western Saharan coast. Pressure from the European Union (EU) forced neighbouring Morocco to clamp down on the illegal human traffic through the previously-favoured Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melillia. But Morocco also controls part of Western Sahara. A disused school in the city of Layoune has been converted into a shelter for around 50 migrants the authorities have arrested there. They will all be repatriated to their respective countries. "We, sub-Saharans and Africans in general, we want to go to Europe because that continent has everything. In the Ivory Coast, for example, we don't have industries or work, nor is there a good policy to create work. We have no choice but go to Europe because one year's work in Europe is worth 30 or 20 years of work in Africa," explains Adama Doubia, a 29 year-old migrant from the Ivory Coast. About 30,000 mostly young Africans managed to evade the authorities last year. The gruelling trip to the Canary Islands takes about five days or more on the high seas in rickety fishing boats, with little food or water. The Red Cross estimates that more than 1,000 Africans have drowned or died from heat exhaustion while trying to make the crossing. Abdullah al-Hairech heads a local support group in Layoune that visits the migrants regularly and gives them food and supplies. "It's a tragedy but we do our best to welcome and cater for these brothers in the best possible conditions and we are looking to create better conditions because they are human beings and they are refugees," he says. Decomposing bodies are regularly found drifting in fishing boats hundreds of kilometres off the mainland, while fishermen have repeatedly brought in corpses plucked from the water. But macabre tales do little to deter young men from countries like Senegal, Mali and the Ivory Coast who see a life in Europe as their only chance of escaping poverty. "There is no hope for the youth and that's what really hurts," said Ibrahim Khalil Toure, from Ivory Coast. "We saw our forefathers who had nothing and we have nothing too. This situation cannot go on forever. We are living under a hammer. We have to choose between life and death. We have to reach Europe. It's the only way." Although fewer migrants have made the dangerous trip this year, migration experts fear a renewed wave as soon as the weather improves.

ITN Source | July 16, 2007

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