Some 6,000 migrants from Morocco were able to reach the Spanish enclave of Ceuta by sea or land on Monday, May 17, according to the Spanish authorities.
Among them are several Moroccans and a thousand minors. Only a migrant would have died by drowning during the crossing.
The authorities of the Ceuta prefecture were to meet to decide what to do with this unique situation. A statement by Spain’s Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska relayed on Tuesday indicates that Spain has returned 1,500 migrants to Morocco and that the authorities are “in the process of continuing these returns”.
Faced with this situation, the Spanish Prime Minister, Pedro Sanchez, canceled his participation in the Summit on the financing of African economies which opened on Tuesday in Paris.
This incident comes in a context where diplomatic relations between Rabat and Madrid have been strained since Spain welcomed, at the end of April, the leader of the Polisario Front, Brahim Ghali, under a false identity and an Algerian diplomatic passport, to be there. cared for.
The head of the Spanish diplomacy, Arancha González Laya, returned to this disagreement between the two countries, following the massive arrival of migrants in Spain. She ruled out any link between the two events from the outset, as if to respond to those who saw the migrants’ crossing as a maneuver on the part of Rabat.
“I do not understand that we can endanger the lives of minors in the sea as we have seen in recent hours in Ceuta” and that this could be “a response to humanitarian action”, he said. she hammered.
The minister again spoke about the motivation that prompted Spain to offer hospitality to Brahim Ghali. “It was, and quite simply, a humanitarian question, a humanitarian response to a request for humanitarian aid from a person who was in a very, very fragile health situation,” she indicated.
By OMA Newsletter N ° 270 of 05/18/2021
OMA, an NGO with an Intercontinental vocation
For the development of cultural exchanges
The enhancement of human potential
The promotion and consolidation of inter-African integration
Keywords: Migrants, Ceuta, Morocco
Country: Morocco, Spain
Geographic position: North Africa, Southern Europe
