Spain and Mauritania have agreed to operate joint coastal patrols and target illegal people-trafficking networks to deter thousands of African migrants from trying to reach Europe by sea. A Spanish government delegation met Mauritanian military chiefs late on Thursday to discuss methods to deal with a crisis which the Spanish Red Cross estimates has cost more than 1000 lives since the start of the year. "The two sides have studied the best ways to handle the migration flows and have adopted a series of measures to tackle this serious humanitarian situation," the two governments said in a joint statement on Friday.Under the agreement, Spain pledged to help Mauritania build and manage reception centres to receive detained migrants. The two sides also agreed to launch joint coastal patrols and Spain would give Mauritania four patrol vessels and help train their crews. Spanish experts would also train Mauritanian security forces to track down migrant-smuggling networks and would give advice on how to detect false identity and travel documents. Madrid also pledged to ask the European Union to give emergency aid to Mauritania.