Record numbers of refugees arrive in Canary Islands by boat

Number of arrivals via world's deadliest migration route approach 32,000 to break 17-year record

Nearly 32,000 men, women and children have reached the Canary Islands by boat so far this year on the world's deadliest migration route, breaking a 17-year-old record for arrivals in the Spanish archipelago.

On Friday and Saturday, four boats carrying a total of 739 people arrived at El Hierro, the smallest and most westerly of the Canary Islands, along with the bodies of two people who had died on the perilous Atlantic route from Africa. A further two people died in hospital.