More than 40 African migrants heading for Spain's Canary Islands drowned at the weekend when their boats sank off the West African coast, Mauritania's Red Crescent organisation said on Monday (March 13). More than 40 other migrants were rescued in the incidents, which took place in waters north of the Mauritanian coastal city of Nouadhibou, off the coasts of Western Sahara and Morocco, a Red Crescent spokesman said.