Nine dead and 48 missing after migrant boat sinks off Canary Islands

Rescue services say they saved 27 of the 84 people aboard the vessel believed to have come from Mauritania

Nine people are confirmed drowned and at least 48 are missing after a boat carrying migrants capsized off Spain's Canary Islands overnight, rescue services said on Saturday, the latest in a series of such disasters off the west coast of Africa.

Sea rescue teams said in a statement they had answered a distress call off El Hierro, one of the islands in the Atlantic archipelago, shortly after midnight. They managed to save 27 of the 84 people on board.