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The president of the European Commission has called for action to strengthen Europe’s borders after tens of thousands of people arrived and quickly left the Spanish territory of Ceuta, triggering a furious row between Madrid and other European countries.
In a letter to Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, on Monday, Ursula von der Leyen said: “From this incident, it is clear that we must do more to further strengthen our borders at critical points, including vigilant monitoring and the use of physical barriers where needed.”
She praised the Spanish socialist leader’s swift handling of the crisis, after the vast majority of migrants left Ceuta and Spanish officials began installing a 500-metre (1,640ft) floating barrier at the border with Morocco. “Order has been restored and the returns system in place worked,” she wrote in the letter.
People arriving in Ceuta from Morocco last week. Photograph: Reduan Dris/EPA
Spain estimates that about 69,500 migrants have returned to Morocco over the past four days, exceeding initial estimates of 50,000 having arrived in the enclave in north Africa on Thursday. Authorities in Ceuta reported that 88 people died trying to reach the territory, while at least 11 deaths have been recorded in Morocco.
Ceuta and Melilla, another Spanish enclave, have the EU’s only land borders with Africa. There are periodic surges in attempted crossings to both cities, although neither permits onward free movement to the EU as they are outside the border-free Schengen zone.
EU interior ministers will hold emergency talks on Tuesday, which von der Leyen said would be a chance to draw lessons from the crossings.
She said the EU should double down on five areas: strengthening cooperation with non-EU countries to prevent migration; stronger external borders; implementing early warning systems; dismantling smuggling networks; and boosting returns of people with no right to stay.
People who arrived in Ceuta from Morocco sitting on the street. Photograph: Reduan/EPA
Italian media reported that Giorgia Meloni’s government wanted to accelerate the opening of offshore migration centres, which Europe’s top human rights expert recently said risked becoming “human rights black holes”.
The EU opened the door to offshore detention centres in June in an unprecedented departure from legal norms as part of a law aiming to increase the deportations of people with no legal right to stay.
Amid heavy criticism of the EU’s divided response to the Ceuta border crossings, von der Leyen stressed that Spain could access EU funds as well as support from the Frontex border agency. So far Madrid has not requested the assistance of Frontex.
The crossings – seized on by far-right politicians across Europe – have exposed deep divisions over migration that have left Spain’s leader isolated.
Over the weekend, Sánchez criticised other governments for failing to support Spain, after Italy and Denmark led calls for its temporary exclusion from the Schengen zone. Sánchez said such an attitude was “driven by prejudice, fake news, ignorance or political interest” and contrary to European and humanitarian law “and the principles of solidarity that bind us together”.
Italy and Denmark organised a letter signed by 20 other EU member states that appeared to blame the crisis on Sánchez’s decision to regularise the status of 500,000 migrants without documents. “We have a duty to effectively deter and relentlessly combat illegal migration,” the 22 leaders wrote, arguing for the need to address “all policies that can serve as pull factors, such as the regularisation of [a] very large number of irregular migrants”.
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📌 Fonte: The Guardian
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