Hundreds of migrants flood across the border

 

Christina Nordh

Published 16:22Updated 21:33

Thousands of migrants have stormed across the border into the Spanish exclave of Ceuta.

Now the authorities are appealing for a state of emergency to be declared.

– It is total chaos, says Rachid Sbihi, head of the union of the police agency Guardia civil, to the AP.

The large migrant flow began on July 25 when hundreds of migrants swam across from Morocco to Ceuta at the Strait of Gibraltar. Since then, more than 1,500 people have arrived in the exclave, which is only 28 square kilometers in size. One night, more than a hundred people tried to cross, but at least nine have drowned at sea, according to the Efe news agency.

On Thursday, thousands of people entered Ceuta, both by swimming around the breakwater and by entering on foot. According to the Spanish news agency Efe, hundreds of migrants managed to cross a barrier when the police were not there.

“Viva España!” some of the migrants shout to a photographer.

Overcrowded reception centers

The reception centers in Ceuta are now overcrowded and hundreds of migrants have been forced to sleep on the streets.

The situation is unsustainable, according to local authorities in Ceuta. Now, Ceuta’s head of government, Juan Jesús Vivas, is asking Spain to declare a national state of emergency. According to him, 200 migrants are now arriving per day.

“We are in a situation of total humanitarian and social emergency,” he says in a statement on Spanish television.

“We cannot handle this pressure on our own, it has resulted in between 1,500 and 2,000 people arriving in just ten days. That is equivalent to two percent of our population. With every passing hour, the situation is getting worse,” he writes in a post according to Deutsche Welle.

Spanish authorities say they will review the security of residents and the border, but that they cannot declare a national emergency due to migration problems.

“Reminiscent of 2021”

According to Daily Sabah, most of the migrants are young Moroccan men who walked past the breakwater on Tarajal beach into local streets. But among the migrants are also families with women and children. A small number of the migrants come from Algeria.

Moroccan police are reported to have stopped “masses” of migrants at the border with Ceuta. By Thursday evening, a five-kilometer-long human column had formed.

Witnesses say the flow of migrants is reminiscent of the border crisis in May 2021, when more than 8,000 migrants poured into Ceuta in just two days.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez and Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska will travel to Ceuta on Friday to learn more about the situation on site.

According to El País, the government has decided to mobilize the army in Ceuta to support the Civil Guard in managing the situation at the border.

Ceuta has 86,566 inhabitants.

Italy is considering suspending the Schengen agreement on free movement between countries due to the migration crisis in Ceuta, according to sources in the Italian Prime Minister's office, writes Reuters.