Politics Incumbent wins presidential election in Mauritania

Mauritania's president has been confirmed in office. According to the provisional final result, Mohammed Ould Ghazouni received 56 percent of the vote in the election at the weekend, as announced by the Mauritanian electoral commission.

His main rival Biram Dah Abeid came in second place with around 22 percent. The results were announced late on Sunday evening after 99 percent of the votes had been counted. Ould Ghazouni was elected for the first time in 2019. After three military coups since 1978, it was the first election in Mauritania that marked a peaceful change at the head of state.

Ould Ghazouni is considered a strategically important partner for the EU. At the beginning of the year, the EU Commission concluded a migration partnership with the country. The aim is to promote legal migration and combat smuggling and human trafficking. The country is also to be supported in taking in refugees.

The number of migrants setting off from Mauritania, for example towards the Canary Islands, which belong to Spain, has risen sharply. According to official Spanish figures, more than 7,000 people have been counted since the beginning of the year. Most of them arrived in small, barely seaworthy boats from Africa across the open Atlantic to the islands to the west of the continent. This was more than in the entire first half of 2023, when a sharp increase in arrivals had already been recorded.