MADRID, Spain.- The Spanish authorities rescued 260 people of Saharan and Maghreb origin who tried to reach the coasts of the south of the country in many precarious vessels, Maritime Rescue reported.

One hundred and twenty immigrants were intercepted when they sailed aboard six rudimentary boats in the Strait of Gibraltar, which separates Europe from Africa and where the natural union between the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean occurs.

According to the services of the body in charge of safety in Spanish waters, its ships helped to other 140 migrants who traveled in three boats in the Alboran Sea, in the most western part of the Mediterranean.

All the rescued, including several women and children, were transferred by the Rescue Coast Guard to different ports of the southern autonomous region of Andalusia.