At least seven people have died and a significant number are lost following a vessel ferrying around two hundred people seeking to enter the European continent capsized near the shoreline of The Gambia, officials state.
The vessel capsized on Wednesday midnight in the vicinity of the village of Jinack in the North Bank area and it was subsequently discovered "stranded on a sandbar", the country's defence ministry stated in a release.
96 individuals have been rescued so far and a search is continuing for the remaining passengers who were on board the shipwrecked vessel that was heading towards the Canary Islands of Spain.
The dangerous voyage over the Atlantic has emerged as a rising pathway for African asylum seekers attempting to get to the EU.
Nearly 47,000 individuals made it to the Spanish archipelago in last year and figures suggest in excess of nine thousand individuals have lost their lives during the journey.
Ongoing Mission
In the aftermath of the disaster, Gambia's naval forces initiated a search-and-rescue operation, deploying multiple navy ships and a commercial fishing craft that came to assist, the defence ministry confirmed.
Authorities say some of the deceased are foreign nationals and that their identities are still being verified.
The deceased of the seven victims who died have been retrieved, and a dozen of the saved are said to be in grave health and undergoing emergency treatment.
A Common Migration Route
The Gambia is one of the routes utilized by migrants seeking to get to the EU, typically through dangerous journeys across ocean and terrain.
Over the past few years, the EU has established pacts with multiple North African nations designed to reducing undocumented migration.
