Pope Leo heads to Canary Islands to highlight perilous journeys of migrants

Bakary Jaiju was 19 when he climbed into a wooden boat in the Gambia and set out for Europe. He would be at sea for seven frightening days as his supplies of food and water gradually ran out.

"You can't even sleep in case you fall in," he recalled, now in Tenerife after finally reaching the Canary Islands late last year in search of a "better life".

"I decided to go, whether I survive or I die, because I want my family to be in a good condition," said Jaiju, explaining why he left his wife and baby behind and risked the treacherous waters of the Atlantic.

In the few months since he reached this southernmost tip of Europe, hundreds of others have died trying.

It is their plight, and the dramatic stories of those who do make it, that Pope Leo will highlight during his visit to the Spanish islands which began in Gran Canaria on Thursday.

The Pope's focus is a clear counterpoint to talk elsewhere of a migration "crisis" and an "ideological invasion".

Data from the UNHCR show the number of migrant arrivals by sea to Spain has fallen significantly this year, partly due to increased interceptions off the West African coast funded by the EU.

So Pope Leo will stress the need for alternative "safe and legal pathways" to Europe but also appeal for a humane approach and "respectful welcome" for those who pay smugglers and are then packed into the most basic of boats.

In Gran Canaria, he will drop flowers into the waves in memory of the migrants who never made it, including entire boatloads that disappeared without trace.

First, his boat with around 160 people on board, including women and children, managed to evade the extra naval patrols off Mauritania and Senegal. Days later, they ran out of fuel only to be spotted and rescued off the tiny Spanish island of El Hierro.

He then spent three "very cold, very difficult" months in a migrant camp in Tenerife until he joined a project helping him to learn Spanish and find a way to stay on the island legally.

The driving force behind that is Padre Pepe, a chatty parish priest in jeans and checked shirt rather than a dog collar.

He realised the number of young migrants on the island was growing, but local authorities only looked after them until they turned 18. From then on, they were on their own.

"But the streets will eat you up, young people are like carrion there," said Padre Pepe.

The Good Samaritan Foundation now offers accommodation and all kinds of workshops to about 170 young men. "The labour market could absorb all these people, there is huge demand," the priest insists.

"It's hard for me to underst