In joint sea operations with Spain, Mauritania has intercepted and expelled almost 10,000 West Africans since May as they attempted to sail in wooden fishing canoes to Spain's Canary Islands and travel on to mainland Europe. Yet thousands of these illegal migrants are still departing from Senegal and The Gambia while others remaining in Mauritania are waiting for their opportunity to set sail.

"I've already paid my 200,000 Mauritanian Ouguiya [US $775] to a Mauritanian smuggler," said a young Guinean working in a restaurant in the capital, Nouakchott, who said his name was Aziz. "We'll leave as soon as all 40 places in the boat have been filled."

He said, "I know it's dangerous but God is great and my friend has already succeeded and is now living in Barcelona."

The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) estimates that so far this year more than 27,000 West Africans have landed on the Spanish archipelago, 100 km off the coast of southern Morocco, driven by poverty,unemployment and hopes for a better living.

At least 500 more migrants have died at sea, according to the Spanish government. The bodies regularly wash up along the long, empty shore of Mauritania, an Islamic republic with less then 3.2 million people living in an area of more than one million sq km, most of which is desert.

Surveillance stepped up

With the help of Spain, Mauritanian security forces have stopped canoes on the high seas or as they were leaving Mauritania's northern fishing port of Nouadhibou, according to a senior immigration official who requested anonymity.

"We have also set up road check points to catch people driving to Nouadhibou from Senegal and Mali," he said.

Mauritania has 63 police checkpoints and 37 gendarmerie checkpoints along its borders with Mali and Senegal, and IOM is providing support to open five more. There has been a massive increase in the number of migrants turned away from the borders, the migration official said, although he had no estimate on the number.

Until recently, Mauritania had done little to stop the mass migration, saying it lacked the means.

"With a 5,000 km land border plus 740 km of marine coast, Mauritania faces enormous difficulties in controlling the persistent illegal migrants in its territory," stated a government report issued during a visit to Mauritania of Spain's secretary of state for foreign affairs, Bernardino Leon Gross, and the secretary of state for security, Antonio Camacho.

In response, Spain sent down four naval boats, a helicopter and 20 specially trained gendarmes known as the "guardia civil" who began arriving in May. Since then, the guardia civil started patrolling the Mauritanian coast and training Mauritanian security forces.

Detention facilities "deplorable"

By July, more than 3,500 West Africans had been arrested and expelled. By August the number almost doubled with another 3,150 detained.

"Some say we are getting better at intercepting the canoes but maybe it was just that more of them are trying to get away," said the Mauritanian migration official, noting that the sea is usually calmer in August. He also said many of the migrants were youths, possibly on their school holidays.

Those caught were taken to a detention centre in Nouadhibou built in April by the Spanish government. It is designed to hold up to 250 people, according to the local Red Crescent, but it is often crowded and in a "deplorable" condition, the aid agency said.

"The toilets are bad and ventilation is a problem with up to 40 migrants in a single room," said Ahmedou Ould Haye, a Red Crescent official. "Windows at the rear of the rooms have been closed off with a wall to prevent people from escaping."

Plans to build four additional detention centres in the cities of Zouerate, Nouakchott, Rosso and Kaedi have been shelved, said the immigration official. "The government's priority now is upcoming elections in November and March," he said.

Evading security

As it turned out, the number of people arrested and expelled dropped off after August. In September only 1,821 were caught and expelled, the official said, suggesting that the migrants were reacting to the joint operation by lying low.

"We know they're still in the country, mostly working amongst local Senegalese fishermen," he said. "Just when everyone gets used to them they will be able to flee without drawing attention".

Senegalese fishermen have lived along the coast of Mauritania for generations. "As long as they have their [Senegalese] identity papers they are allowed to stay," said the official.

In theory, the laws toughened in 2001 when Mauritania officially broke with the West African bloc known as ECOWAS. Yet the country continued to allow free movement of people and goods between Senegal, Mali, and The Gambia. Although from 2002 people from Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea and other West African countries needed visas to enter Mauritania, an official in the government's Security Service told IRIN that in practice they enter the country with just their national identity cards.

In fact the government has barely begun to deal with the problem, the official said. In 2003, Mauritania signed an agreement with Spain to repatriate all illegal migrants known to have transited through Mauritania.

However, the Mauritanian government has yet to adjust its laws. The only West Africans expelled are those who didn't have papers or who were caught in canoes heading for Europe without a visa, said the official.

So far, naval patrols are mostly only intercepting canoes when they entered Mauritania waters on their way up the coast from Senegal and The Gambia, but the canoes are now increasingly going further out to sea to avoid detection,he said. That makes the voyage more dangerous.

He said, "The canoes we catch are mostly the ones forced to stop in Mauritania because they had problems with their motors or because they got lost and ran out of supplies."