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IMMIGRATION

400 African migrants see Spain dream dashed

Moroccan police drove back 400 African migrants who tried to rush across the country's border into Spain on Thursday, an official said.

400 African migrants see Spain dream dashed
African migrants point at the frontier with Melilla, a Spanish-governed territory bordering northern Morocco. Photo: Fadel Senna

It was the latest in a wave of desperate bids by Africans to reach Europe that have left hundreds dead and police and migrants injured.

The crowd of "sub-Saharan migrants" rushed at the crossing from northern Morocco into the Spanish territory of Ceuta at dawn and "were stopped by the Moroccan security forces," a Spanish government official in Ceuta told AFP.

"They tried to rush across the border, but none managed to enter Spain," and the situation at the border soon returned to normal, he said.

He could not say whether anyone was injured, but said it "was one of the biggest groups in recent years" to make the attempt.

On September 17, some 350 migrants tried to reach Ceuta by swimming to one of its beaches from a nearby Moroccan shore and about 91 made it into the territory.

That same day in Melilla, the other of Spain's two territories on the northern Moroccan coast, 300 migrants tore down part of the border fence and 100 made it through, with scores of people injured.

Spain and Morocco deployed boosted security at the borders after those attempts.

Thousands of migrants fleeing poverty and unrest in Africa try to enter Europe each year, by land into Ceuta and Melilla and by sea to Spain or Italy, often in flimsy vessels.

A shipwreck off the Italian island of Lampedusa on October 3 left at least 359 migrants dead, according to media.

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IMMIGRATION

France ‘will not welcome migrants’ from Lampedusa: interior minister

France "will not welcome migrants" from the island, Gérald Darmanin has insisted

France 'will not welcome migrants' from Lampedusa: interior minister

France will not welcome any migrants coming from Italy’s Lampedusa, interior minister Gérald Darmanin has said after the Mediterranean island saw record numbers of arrivals.

Some 8,500 people arrived on Lampedusa on 199 boats between Monday and Wednesday last week, according to the UN’s International Organisation for
Migration, prompting European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen to travel there Sunday to announce an emergency action plan.

According to Darmanin, Paris told Italy it was “ready to help them return people to countries with which we have good diplomatic relations”, giving the
example of Ivory Coast and Senegal.

But France “will not welcome migrants” from the island, he said, speaking on French television on Tuesday evening.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has called on Italy’s EU partners to share more of the responsibility.

The recent arrivals on Lampedusa equal more than the whole population of the tiny Italian island.

The mass movement has stoked the immigration debate in France, where political parties in the country’s hung parliament are wrangling over a draft law governing new arrivals.

France is expected to face a call from Pope Francis for greater tolerance towards migrants later this week during a high-profile visit to Mediterranean city Marseille, where the pontiff will meet President Emmanuel Macron and celebrate mass before tens of thousands in a stadium.

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