In total, around 1,200 migrants “began, around 07:25 (06:25 GMT), to cross the fence (…) throwing stones and using hooks and sticks against the” Spanish security forces, “after having outflanked the forces Moroccan security,” said the prefecture of Melilla. According to the prefect, Sabrina Moh Abdelkader, 380 managed to enter.
On the Moroccan side, the situation was calm overnight from Thursday to Friday in the small town of Beni Ansar, which adjoins the Spanish enclave of Melilla, AFP journalists noted. No presence of migrants was noticed on the 15 km road along the border fence bristling with barbed wire, nor in the center of Beni Ansar.
“They usually move away into the forests of the surrounding hills,” a member of the local branch of the Moroccan Association for Human Rights (AMDH) told AFP.
“Aggressiveness”
This new arrival comes the day after an attempt to cross about 2,500 African migrants, the most massive ever recorded in this enclave, according to the authorities. 491 succeeded and were still Thursday in the enclave, in a center for migrants.
In two days, more than 800 migrants have therefore managed to enter this enclave, compared to 1,092 in 2021.
“The aggressiveness that we witnessed, yesterday as today (…) had not been observed on other occasions”, denounced the prefect whose services announced the arrival Thursday of a hundred reinforcement police.
“It is a very worrying fact. It has been months since this type of arrival happened, and when there were attempts, they were repelled, in collaboration with the Moroccan authorities, without reaching this level. of seriousness”, worried for his part the Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares.
In Rabat, the spokesman for the Moroccan government assured for his part that his country was doing “a colossal job to monitor its borders”. According to the authorities, 27 members of the Spanish security forces were injured on Wednesday and 23 on Thursday, as were 20 migrants on Wednesday and 32 on Thursday.
The Moroccan Association for Human Rights reported on Wednesday about thirty injured migrants, three or four of them seriously, who were hospitalized. “Around 250 migrants who were turned back from Melilla this morning were transferred by bus to the Arkmane (detention) centre. It is likely that they returned after their failed attempt yesterday,” an activist from the AMDH.
EU land border
Melilla and Ceuta, nearly 400 kilometers further west, are the EU’s only land borders on the African continent and are regularly subject to attempted entry by migrants seeking to reach Europe .
In Melilla, the border between Morocco and Spain is materialized by a triple mesh fence with a length of about 12 km. Like that of Ceuta, it is equipped with cameras and watchtowers.
These massive influxes of migrants into the enclave come less than a year after that, in mid-May 2021 in Ceuta, of more than 10,000 migrants, the vast majority of them Moroccans.
Thanks to a relaxation of border controls on the Moroccan side, they had then entered by swimming by the sea or at the level of the dyke marking the border in the Mediterranean.
This crisis took place in a context of major diplomatic quarrel between Madrid and Rabat, caused by the reception in Spain, to be treated there for Covid, of the leader of the Sahrawi separatists of the Polisario Front, Brahim Ghali, sworn enemy of the Moroccan authorities. While tensions have since eased, they have not ended.
The recent conversation between Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez and Mr. Ghali, on the sidelines of an EU-African Union summit in Brussels, made Rabat cringe, according to the media close to the government.
“By meeting in Brussels with the leader of the separatists (…), Pedro Sanchez provides proof that the Kingdom of Morocco was right not to believe in the fine words of Spanish officials”, wrote the Moroccan site in particular. information Le360. Recalled for consultations during the Ceuta crisis, Morocco’s ambassador to Spain has still not returned to Madrid.
Spain has exercised its sovereignty over Ceuta since 1580 and over Melilla since 1496. Morocco considers them an integral part of its territory. Located 150 km from Algeria, Melilla (12.5 km2) has a population of nearly 87,000 inhabitants.
by Ismaïl BELLAOUALI, with Hazel WARD in Madrid