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BANJUL, Sunday (AFP)

Rescuers recovered 300 bodies after the sinking of a Senegalese ferry off west Africa, dimming hopes of finding more survivors as Senegal's president admitted the state's responsibility in possibly one of the world's worst maritime disasters.

Meanwhile The bodies of about 300 victims are expected to arrive in the west African state of Gambia local officials said, bringing the total number of bodies recovered to 350.

Local naval officials in the port of Banjul said two boats were due to arrive carrying a total of 309 bodies. A further 41 had been recovered on Friday, while 61 people have been rescued.

The Joola was carrying almost 800 people when it went down in stormy seas on Thursday night off Gambia on its way to the Senegalese capital Dakar.

Senegal's Prime Minister Mame Madior Boye said 63 survivors have been found, but she held out little hope that rescuers would find any more.

"Divers are at the scene.., perhaps there are still chances of finding survivors, but they are slim," she told reporters after visiting the main hospital in Dakar.

She reiterated her belief that the tragedy was caused by adverse weather conditions, and not by any "human or technical fault."

However, President Abdoulaye Wade blamed "an accumulation of errors."

"The responsibility of the state is obvious," he told a crowd of several hundred angry Senegalese in Dakar demanding answers about the tragedy.

"It has been established that the boat was overcrowded," Wade said, adding that people had been allowed on without tickets. "(The boat) was too high in the water, too slow."

Wade said the state would compensate the families of victims. "I understand their anger, their pain."

The press in the west African state has been quick to criticise the government about the seaworthiness of the ship, which tipped over as it was being lashed by winds and heavy rains.

UN Secretary General Kofi Annan was "deeply saddened" by the tragedy and sent his condolences to the government, families and friends of the victims, his spokesman said.

The Joola was carrying 796 passengers when it left Ziguinchor, the main town of the southern Senegalese province of Casamance, for Dakar, officials said. Most of those missing are Senegalese nationals, along with a number of foreigners from neighbouring Guinea-Bissau and Gambia, as well as French, Spanish and Swiss nationals.

"Criminal negligence," the Sud newspaper declared in a front-page headline. The Joola, which had returned to service earlier this month after a year of repairs, "should never have taken to the sea."

The paper said some passengers had noticed that the boat was unbalanced from the start of the journey.

Another Dakar-based newspaper, Walfadjri, said the tragedy had been caused by negligence and technical failings affecting the engines - one of which had been repaired from salvaged parts while the other was still being run in.

The paper also blamed overcrowding - after marine officials said the Joola had been designed to carry only 550 people - and condemned the government's decision to return the Joola to service as "criminal populism."

"The water rose very fast and in barely five minutes it had sunk," said one survivor Ousmane Keita, who had clung to a life jacket until help arrived.

The government earlier this month showed off the boat's return to service and on Friday insisted that its condition was "not in any doubt."

But even the pro-government Soleil newspaper joined in the criticism.

If the Joola was incapable of travelling in high winds, the paper said, "it should not have been at sea."

The Joola served as an important link between Dakar and Casamance, which lie on opposite sides of Gambia's narrow territory and the river of the same name.

Casamance has been plagued by a violent separatist insurgency for two decades.

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