Spain arrests crew of migrant boat after eight deaths, including baby

MADRID (Reuters) - Spanish police have arrested seven crew members of a crammed migrant boat that arrived in the Canary Islands in December from Senegal over the alleged killing of eight passengers, including a toddler, the Civil Guard said on Wednesday.

The boat arrived to La Restinga port in the island of El Hierro on December 28 with 224 people on board, some of whom had to be immediately treated for serious injuries, presumably sustained in a brawl during the seven-day crossing, police said in statement.

Passengers told investigators that eight people who travelled with them were killed by the crew members.

A court in the Canaries, which dealt with three of those arrested, said there was evidence that the crew had specifically targeted people of different nationalities to theirs.

Among the dead were a 14-month-old Gambian boy as well as a Guinean father and son, aged 50 and 18 respectively. Spanish authorities would not disclose where the crew were from.

All seven suspects were sent to jail pending further investigation, police said.

In a separate case last year, police also arrested the crew of a boat that reached El Hierro on November 3 2024, for allegedly killing four passengers during the voyage along the perilous route.

The seven Spanish islands off northwestern Africa's Atlantic coast are struggling to absorb a surge in irregular migration, mainly from Mali, Senegal and Morocco. The open-sea crossing in precarious boats that are often run by migrant trafficking gangs claims thousands of lives yearly.

Arrivals in the archipelago hit an all-time high of 46,843 people last year, making up 73% of the illegal migration to Spain, according to interior ministry data.

(Reporting by Emma Pinedo, edititng by Andrei Khalip and Angus MacSwan)