Mauritania's coastguard rescued 315 migrants, including 40 children and adolescents, from a disabled wooden pirogue drifting off the fishing port of Nouadhibou during the night of Wednesday to Thursday.
The overloaded vessel had departed from The Gambia carrying 191 Senegalese, 123 Gambians and one Malian national and was found adrift in what authorities described as a difficult humanitarian situation. The rescue comes days after Mauritanian forces pulled 42 migrants from another drifting boat in the same waters.
The Atlantic route to the Canary Islands remains one of the deadliest migration corridors. In July alone, 144 people died or went missing attempting the crossing, according to the UNHCR.