After a sizable mob attempted to enter Spain’s Melilla enclave from Morocco today, five migrants were killed and numerous others were injured.
Around 2,000 migrants approached the only land border the EU has with Africa around dawn, and more than 500 of them succeeded in crossing after hacking through a fence with shears, according to a statement from the Spanish government’s local delegation.
‘All of them men and apparently adults’—the 130 sub-Saharan African migrants—were able to enter Melilla, it was stated.
Five deaths were reported as they attacked the border, and some of them fell from the top of the barrier, according to a Moroccan officer from the nearby border town of Nador.
It was the first such large-scale infiltration since Spain and Morocco normalized their diplomatic relations last month, according to him, and 76 migrants along with 140 security officers were injured.
The local delegation of the Spanish government only reported that 57 migrants, including three who were hospitalized, had injuries of varied degrees while 49 Spanish police officers were merely mildly injured
In a previous statement, it was stated that Morocco had sent out a “large” number of forces to try to thwart the border invasion, who “cooperated actively” with Spain’s security forces.
Images in Spanish-language media showed weary migrants in Melilla lying on the sidewalk, some with bloody hands and ripped clothing.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez denounced the “violent assault” in a speech in Brussels, attributing it to “mafias who traffic in human beings.”
As they sprinted through Melilla’s streets after jumping the fence, migrants could be seen on video cheering and waving their arms in joy.
Even before the war made exporting Ukrainian grain to Somalia, Egypt, and other impoverished countries hard, there are concerns that the drought in Africa and rising food prices could increase the number of refugees leaving for Europe.
The incursion, according to AMDH Nador, a Moroccan human rights watchdog, happened a day after migrants and Moroccan security forces fought over camps that the migrants had built in a woodland close to Melilla.
Omar Naji, the chairman of the watchdog, told Reuters that since Spanish and Moroccan authorities launched joint patrols and increased security in the area surrounding the enclave, the incident was a part of a “intense crackdown” on migrants.
According to an earlier statement from the local delegation, Morocco sent out a “large” number of troops on Friday to try to thwart the attack on the border. These troops “cooperated actively” with the Spanish security authorities.
It said that the migrants were “perfectly organised and violent,” but noted that a “significant number” did manage to enter Melilla.
Images on Spanish media showed exhausted migrants laying on the sidewalk in Melilla, some with bloodied hands and torn clothes.
Those who succeeded in crossing went to a local migrant center, where authorities were evaluating their circumstances.
A spokesperson for the Spanish government’s office in Melilla, who could not be identified by name in keeping with government rules, said several hundred people remained gathered on the Moroccan side.
People fleeing poverty and violence sometimes make mass attempts to reach Melilla and the other Spanish territory on the North African coast, Ceuta, as a springboard to continental Europe.
Spain normally relies on Morocco to keep migrants away from the border.
At the beginning of March, more than 3,500 people tried to scale the 20-foot (6-metre) barrier that perimeters Melilla, and nearly 1,000 making it across, according to Spanish authorities.
Friday’s crossings were the first attempt since relations between Spain and Morocco improved in March after a year-long dispute centered on the Western Sahara, a former Spanish colony annexed by Morocco in 1976.
After ending the year-long diplomatic crisis, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez then visited Rabat, and the two governments hailed a ‘new stage’ in relations.
The row began when Madrid allowed Brahim Ghali, leader of Western Sahara’s pro-independence Polisario Front, to be treated for Covid-19 in a Spanish hospital in April 2021.
The row began when Madrid allowed Brahim Ghali, leader of Western Sahrara’s pro-independence Polisario Front, to be treated for Covid-19 in a Spanish hospital in April 2021.
A month later, some 10,000 migrants surged across the Moroccan border into Spain’s Ceuta enclave as border guards looked the other way, in what was widely seen as a punitive gesture by Rabat.
Rabat calls for the Western Sahara to have an autonomous status under Moroccan sovereignty but the Polisario wants a UN-supervised referendum on self-determination as agreed in a 1991 ceasefire agreement.
In the days just before Morocco and Spain patched up their ties, there were several attempted mass crossings of migrants in Melilla, including one involving 2,500 people, the largest such attempt on record. Nearly 500 made it across.
Patching up relationship with Morocco, the departure point for many migrants, has meant a drop in arrivals, notably in Spain’s Atlantic Canary Islands.
The number of migrants who reached the Canary Islands in April was 70 percent lower than in February, government figures show.
Sanchez earlier this month warned that ‘Spain will not tolerate any use of the tragedy of illegal immigration as a means of pressure.’
Spain will seek to have ‘irregular migration’ listed as one of the security threats on the NATO’s southern flank when the alliance gathers for a summit in Madrid on June 29-30.
Over the years, thousands of migrants have attempted to cross the 12-kilometre (7.5-mile) border between Melilla and Morocco, or Ceuta’s eight-kilometre border, by climbing the fences, swimming along the coast or hiding in vehicles.
The two territories are protected by fences fortified with barbed wire, video cameras and watchtowers.
The attempts include violent clashes between those crossing and the agents charged to stop them.
Migrants sometimes use hooks and sticks to try to climb the border fence, and throw stones at police.
Claimed by Morocco, the two cities have long been a flashpoint in diplomatic relations between Rabat and Madrid, which insists both are integral parts of Spain.
Earlier this month, five European Union nations on the Mediterranean who fear possible waves of refugees driven by hunger out of Africa called Saturday for an end to the EU’s ‘voluntary’ solidarity on migrants and a better way to redistribute the burden of caring for them.
The Interior ministers from Italy, Cyprus, Greece, Malta and Spain wrapped up two days of talks in Venice amid worries that the blockade of Ukraine grain exports due to Russia’s invasion could see huge numbers of refugees from Africa flooding southern Europe.
Cypriot Interior Minister Nicos Nouris told reporters that robust, common EU policy is needed on migration. ‘Solidarity is not a slogan, nor can it be void of substance,’ Nouris said.
Past EU policies in which member countries could offer to receive some of the hundreds of thousands of migrants landing in Italy, Greece and other southern shores proved grossly inadequate.
Many EU countries didn’t step forward. Others, even with they did pledge to receive modest numbers of some of the hundreds of thousands of migrants rescued from smugglers’ unseaworthy boats, didn’t follow through.
‘Solidarity in our mind cannot be voluntary,″ Nouris said.
He noted that after several years of Cyprus taking in migrants, now 5% of the eastern Mediterranean island nation’s population consists of asylum-seekers.
The meeting did not address the millions of Ukrainian refugees who recently flooded into northern EU nations like Poland, Hungary and Romania.
How Europe handles large numbers of migrants takes on particular urgency now, amid fears that drought in Africa and surging food prices even before the war made shipping Ukrainian grain to Somalia, Egypt and other poor nations impossible could drive up the already alarmingly numbers of hungry people.
In the Sahel, the part of Africa just below the Sahara desert, an estimated 18 million people are facing severe hunger as farmers endure their worst production season in more than a decade.
Italian Interior Minister Luciana Lamorgese cited the blocking of grain in Ukraine as just another reason for the EU to develop a ‘adequate mechanism of distributing migrants’ among its members.
She also pressed for more repatriation agreements with countries whose people are seeking a better life in Europe but had their asylum bids rejected since they are fleeing poverty, not war or persecution.
Meanwhile, the UK is facing a migrant crisis, with thousands of migrants crossing the English Channel in small boats to reach Britain each month.
A total of 11,928 migrants have crossed the English Channel in 2022, nearly twice as many as the 5,906 who came over the same time period in 2021. On Thursday, 138 people braved the dangerous voyage in three boats.
The first group, consisting of between 45 and 50 people, was carried into Dover, Kent on board Border Force cutter Defender at before 8am, despite forecasts for heavy seas. There were a few women and children among them.
Around 1:00 p.m., a second group of about 50 individuals was transported into the harbor on the Border Force vessel Ranger. After battling the cold at sea, they could be seen wrapped in blue blankets and sporting red hats.
It happened while controversial preparations to transport migrants to the African nation, Rwanda, were underway as Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his wife Carrie travelled there for an official visit.
Mr. Johnson has vehemently supported Britain’s approach, contending that it is a proper means of protecting lives and thwarting the criminal gangs who transport immigrants across the English Channel in small boats. In recent years, illegal immigrants from countries like Syria, Afghanistan, Iran, Sudan, Iraq, and Yemen have flooded into Britain.
However, the European Court of Human Rights intervened last week, stating the plan contained a “real risk of irreversible harm,” forcing Britain to cancel a flight that was intended to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda.
The flight’s cancellation followed three days of frenetic court challenges by attorneys for immigrant rights who filed a flurry of individual petitions in an effort to stop the deportation of everyone on the government’s list.
Officials from the British government had earlier in the day stated that the plane would take off regardless of the number of passengers. However, after the appeals, nobody was left.
After the flight was canceled, Home Secretary Priti Patel said she was disappointed but would not be ‘deterred from doing the right thing.’
She added: ‘Our legal team are reviewing every decision made on this flight and preparation for the next flight begins now.’
In 59 dinghies and other small craft, 2,364 migrants have already arrived in the UK this month.
The busiest day was June 14, when 444 passengers braved the perilous 21-mile Dover Straits.
Compared to 8,410 who arrived in 2020, 28,526 persons made the border in 2021, according to official government statistics.
Dover MP Natalie Elphicke has said: ‘These shocking figures underline yet again why urgent action is needed.
‘It’s disappointing that the efforts being made by the Government to save lives and stop the people traffickers are being undermined by people who should know better.
‘They should think again and support the action being taken to bring these treacherous journeys to an end.
‘Let’s not forget that these criminal smuggling gangs have a callous disregard for everyone.
‘Too many lives have been lost in doomed attempts to cross the English Channel. It needs to end.’