A disabled cargo ship packed with hundreds of would-be migrants to Europe has been drifting off the coast of Mauritania for more than two weeks because the Mauritanian government has refused to allow the ship to dock.

The ship, together with a Spanish coastguard tugboat towing it, are currently sitting in international waters some 40km off the Mauritanian coast, while the Spanish and Mauritanian governments negotiate a solution.

Aid workers estimate there are as many as 400 passengers onboard, about half on whom are from Pakistan, with the rest from African countries including Somalia, Ethiopia, Ivory Coast and Guinea Conakry.

The exact number of passengers and their origins are not known because aid workers have not been allowed onto the ship. The Spanish Red Cross and the Mauritanian Red Crescent have jointly sent food and relief supplies by boat but these were transferred to the cargo ship by the Spanish tug.

“We have only talked to passengers and crew by radio,” said Ahmedou Ould Haye, the regional delegate for the Red Crescent in Nouadhibou. He said they seem to be coping but some have diarrhoea. “We are also worried about how long their morale will hold out,” he said.

Government’s position

Mauritania is a signatory to international conventions under the International Maritime Organization, which oblige governments to provide ship wreck survivors with “a place of safety [and to meet their] basic human needs (such as food, shelter and medical needs)”.

The agreements, known as the 1974 International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea and the 1979 International Convention on Maritime Search and Rescue were amended in July to clarify government’s responsibilities.

“While an assisting ship may serve as a temporary place of safety, it should be relieved of this responsibility as soon as alternative arrangements can be made,” the amendment states.

The Mauritanian government has not yet made an official public statement on the issue, however Mauritanian officials told IRIN their government wants the Spanish rescue boat to either take the ship to the Spanish Canary Islands, which is where they believe it was headed, or back to where it came from.

“Our government’s position is that the ship was in Spanish waters off the Canary Islands when the Spanish marine authority began towing it,” said a senior Mauritanian immigration official, who asked not to be named because he is not authorized to speak.

“We have agreed to receive boats with illegal immigrants caught in Mauritanian waters, but we have not agreed to receive ships towed from somewhere else,” he said.

Another senior official in a separate ministry who said he did not want to be named either confirmed this position.

Humanitarian imperative

Spanish Red Cross official Jaime Bara said the ship did indeed appear to have been heading for Spain’s Canary Islands, an entry point to Europe used by tens of thousands of Africans attempting to migrate illegally to Europe every year.

“We know the ship last docked in Guinea Conakry but we are not sure where it was before then or how long the passengers have been at sea.” Bara said.

“Clearly the governments of Spain and Mauritania have different views on which country is responsible,” he added.

Spain’s secretary of state for foreign affairs Bernardino Leon Gross flew to Mauritania on Thursday and meet with President Ely Ould Mohamed Vall, but no decision was announced following meeting.

The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) said humanitarian concerns should take priority over legal matters.

“At this point in time, the main priority should be to help these people and not let them drift on the high seas in precarious conditions,” George Okoth-Obbo, Director for Protection of the United Nations Agency for Refugees [UNHCR] said in a statement issued on Thursday.

“UNHCR urges, on humanitarian grounds, that people on board this ship be allowed to disembark as soon as possible.”