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IMMIGRATION

Spain returns migrants to Morocco after storming of Melilla enclave

Spain sent 55 migrants back to Morocco on Monday a day after they forced their way into the Spanish territory of Melilla during an assault on the border in which two migrants died and 19 were injured.

Published: 23 October 2018 09:29 CEST
Spain returns migrants to Morocco after storming of Melilla enclave

A total of 208 migrants entered Melilla on Sunday after climbing over two barbed wire fences which separate the tiny territory from northern Morocco. 

READ MORE: At least one dead as 200 migrants reach Spain's Melilla enclave

Madrid has “readmitted 55 people” who entered Melilla to Morocco, the Spanish central government's representative in the territory said in a statement.

Another 140 migrants have requested asylum, 10 are recovering from their injuries and three are minors, it said.   

Spain has become the main entry point for migrants and asylum-seekers looking for a better life in Europe as other EU countries tighten up controls at their borders. A smuggling route through Libya to Italy has also been complicated by conflict and violence there.

One man who took part in the mass storming of the border died shortly after he entered Melilla of a suspected heart attack.   

“The preliminary results of the autopsy indicate there is no external injury which caused his death,” the statement said.   

Another migrant died on the Moroccan side of the border in the attempt to cross over to Melilla.

Moroccan authorities arrested 141 people as they tried to cross.   

Several Spanish Catholic associations which aid migrants issued a joint statement condemning the quick expulsion of the migrants from Melilla.   

“Speed is not always a symptom of efficiency when what is at stake is people's lives and future,” it said.

Melilla, together with a second Spanish enclave, Ceuta, have the European Union's only land borders with Africa.   

Over 47,000 migrants have made it north to Spain since the start of the year, including about 5,000 by land, according to the International Organisation for Migration.

An increasing number of Moroccans are attempting to reach Europe, either by taking the perilous sea route or via the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla, which border Morocco.

Morocco, which many Africans can visit without visas, has become a major gateway for sub-Saharan migrants into Europe.   

Moroccan authorities say they have stopped some 54,000 attempts by migrants to cross into Spain this year.

READ ALSO:  Spain and Morocco in talks to repatriate migrant minors 

CRIME

Germany mulls expulsions to Afghanistan after knife attack

Germany said Tuesday it was considering allowing deportations to Afghanistan, after an asylum seeker from the country injured five and killed a police officer in a knife attack.

Published: 4 June 2024 14:50 CEST
Germany mulls expulsions to Afghanistan after knife attack

Officials had been carrying out an “intensive review for several months… to allow the deportation of serious criminals and dangerous individuals to Afghanistan”, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser told journalists.

“It is clear to me that people who pose a potential threat to Germany’s security must be deported quickly,” Faeser said.

“That is why we are doing everything possible to find ways to deport criminals and dangerous people to both Syria and Afghanistan,” she said.

Deportations to Afghanistan from Germany have been completely stopped since the Taliban retook power in 2021.

But a debate over resuming expulsions has resurged after a 25-year-old Afghan was accused of attacking people with a knife at an anti-Islam rally in the western city of Mannheim on Friday.

A police officer, 29, died on Sunday after being repeatedly stabbed as he tried to intervene in the attack.

Five people taking part in a rally organised by Pax Europa, a campaign group against radical Islam, were also wounded.

Friday’s brutal attack has inflamed a public debate over immigration in the run up to European elections and prompted calls to expand efforts to expel criminals.

READ ALSO: Tensions high in Mannheim after knife attack claims life of policeman

The suspect, named in the media as Sulaiman Ataee, came to Germany as a refugee in March 2013, according to reports.

Ataee, who arrived in the country with his brother at the age of only 14, was initially refused asylum but was not deported because of his age, according to German daily Bild.

Ataee subsequently went to school in Germany, and married a German woman of Turkish origin in 2019, with whom he has two children, according to the Spiegel weekly.

Per the reports, Ataee was not seen by authorities as a risk and did not appear to neighbours at his home in Heppenheim as an extremist.

Anti-terrorism prosecutors on Monday took over the investigation into the incident, as they looked to establish a motive.

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