Spain arrests 7 men accused of killing 4 asylum seekers en route from Africa to the Canaries – Firstpost

Seven human traffickers accused of killing four migrants during a sea crossing to the Canary Islands have been arrested, Spanish law enforcement said on Sunday (December 29).

The murders happened in November this year when the group attempted to enter Spanish territory from the African mainland.

“They are suspected of killing four of the people, two days before the boat reached the Canaries coast,” the police said.

They described the seven people– now detained at an emergency accommodation centre on the island of Tenerife– as the “captains” of a vessel that docked on the island of El Hierro on November 3. The ship had 207 asylum seekers onboard.

What happened?

The police probe into the deaths was launched after witness accounts from the surviving asylum seekers, who described the journey as “a nightmare”.

The investigation found that after leaving the coast of Gambia, the boat made a stopover at the Senegalese island of Bassoul. This is where most of the passengers boarded the vessel.

The passengers had spent three days at sea when three traffickers– who were assigned to maintaining order onboard– decided to punish some of the asylum seekers.

The police said that these people “apparently decided to murder four of the migrants to frighten the rest”.

Three of the victims have been identified, and their families have been notified.

One of the passengers, “who was probably affected by the harshness of the journey, became disoriented, which led the captains to blame him for all the problems of the crossing and start beating him and those who tried to defend him”, the police said.

One of the surviving asylum seekers was taken to hospital for surgery to his chest due to what police said may have been a knife wound.

A tragic, regular occurrence

In 2024, over 10,400 asylum seekers– many fleeing war, persecution, or poverty at home– have either gone missing at sea or drowned while trying to reach Spain, according to a recent report by human rights organisation Caminando Fronteras.

Spain is one of the primary destinations for asylum seekers attempting to enter the European Union, alongside Italy and Greece.

In recent years, the number of undocumented migrants coming in via the Canaries, which is a mere 100 kilometres away from Africa at its closest point to the continent, has been rising.

Spanish sea rescue teams say they have gone to the aid of a dozen boats in difficulty, carrying more than 500 people in total, in the dangerous waters around the archipelago.

With inputs from agencies