EFE
A total of 81 undocumented immigrants have been detained this Tuesday on the coasts of the Canary Islands, after 33 of them were rescued near Fuerteventura in a boat that was presumed missing and 48 arrived in La Palma in what is the first boat of this type to arrive on this island.
The boat rescued near Fuerteventura had been missing for about thirty hours, when at around 12:45 p.m. today, Maritime Rescue alerted the Air Rescue Service (SAR) because it needed an aerial means to locate a small boat that had left Africa during the night.
This operation was carried out after the occupants of the boat called an acquaintance who was in Africa and the emergency services.
The boat was found about thirty kilometers southeast of Fuerteventura, and the immigrants were transferred to Gran Tarajal, where they were attended to by Red Cross personnel.
The second boat located this Tuesday is the first to arrive in La Palma and its approach to the beach of El Porís, in the municipality of Mazo, was seen by a neighbor.
The neighbor is Juan Carlos Rodríguez, who watched in disbelief as a boat approached the beach, and at first thought it might be tourists, but observed that the boat crashed against the sand and many people came out of it running in all directions.
At that moment Juan Carlos Rodríguez felt fear, but he shouted to the immigrants to stay still, upon which they stopped and sat down, he explained.
Juan Carlos Rodríguez commented that several neighbors gave the immigrants a box of bananas, twenty loaves of bread, shortbreads, cookies and tomatoes, which they shared, and added that around 3:27 p.m. he called the Emergency Coordination Center of La Palma.
Mamaru, one of the 48 immigrants who arrived in La Palma, said that they all come from Ivory Coast and that they left El Aaiún five days ago.
He stated that, although they do not know where they have arrived, their intention was to do so in the Canary Islands to try their luck in work and get ahead, and added that there is no captain among them, as well as that they did not pay anything for the boat.
The immigrants arrived with water boots and warm clothes, and, according to the Red Cross coordinator Alexis Rodríguez, none have symptoms of hypothermia or dehydration, but one had to be treated for a blow to the chest that he suffered when falling from the boat on the beach.
The immigrants are all adult males who, according to Mamaru, spent three days of bad weather at sea and without water since Monday.
This version has been questioned by the president of the Cabildo de La Palma, José Luis Perestelo, given the good health of the immigrants, although he did not dare to assure that they were left near the coast of La Palma by a mother ship.
Perestelo also doubts the Comprehensive External Surveillance System (SIVE) due to the fact that this boat has not been detected on a day with high visibility and with the sea calm.
In addition, the president of the Cabildo de La Palma called attention to the "scarce" mobilization of Civil Guard troops, since he pointed out that at first there were four troops on the beach and stressed that luckily they are peaceful people and there have been no problems.
The immigrants, once attended to by the health personnel, have been transferred to the El Fuerte military barracks, in the Palmeran municipality of Breña Baja.
