RESCUE workers were deployed today to scour the seas and shores of southern Spain, searching for 17 missing refugees — a day after finding the bodies of 17 others who died.

The refugees had left north Africa in flimsy boats trying to cross the Mediterranean.

The Spanish Civil Guard said it had found four bodies and 22 survivors yesterday, all men from northern Africa, after their wooden dinghy hit a reef close to the coast, west of the Strait of Gibraltar.

Thirteen of the survivors are thought to be unaccompanied minors.

Seventeen other refugees are missing but could have reached Spanish shores, so the Civil Guard resumed the land-sea search for them today.

Spanish maritime rescuers found 80 people, including five women, on Monday and recovered the bodies of 13 dead asylum-seekers in the Alboran Sea, which is part of the western Mediterranean route into Europe.

They were travelling in two boats, the Spanish Maritime Rescue Service said, adding that they had all been transferred to the Spanish colonial enclave of Melilla, which borders Morocco.

The UN says over 2,160 people have perished trying to cross the Mediterranean to Europe this year, 564 of them bound for Spain.

At the Strait of Gibraltar, Africa and Europe are less than nine miles apart, but the waters there can be dangerous due to high winds and strong currents.

However, the short distance has made that route the most popular choice for refugees heading to Europe after fleeing violence or poverty at home.