Hundreds of migrants rescued off the coast of the Canary Islands

Following a record-breaking amount of migrants arriving to the Canary Islands last year, almost 400 were rescued on Monday.

Transcript

00:00Hundreds of migrants were rescued off the coast of the Canary Islands.

00:07Most of the 389 migrants were men, but there were also 46 women and 5 minors on board,

00:13according to local authorities.

00:16Five of the rescued boats were heading to Lanzarote, while two were heading to the island

00:21of El Hierro.

00:23More than 43,000 migrants arrived to the Canary Islands in 2024, a record-breaking figure.

00:30Last year, European politics took a turn to the right, particularly after EU elections

00:35in June.

00:36As such, many EU member states have started to update their migration policies, just as

00:42migration also comes to the top of the European Council's agenda.

00:47In a letter to EU member states, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen

00:51proposed speeding up the return of asylum seekers and opening detention centres in third

00:55countries.