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IMMIGRATION

Spain may be new migrant hotspot, EU border agency chief warns

The head of the EU's border agency warned Sunday the western Mediterranean route from Morocco to Spain might develop into the next key pathway for migrants seeking to reach Europe.

Spain may be new migrant hotspot, EU border agency chief warns
Photo: AFP

“If you ask me what is my current biggest worry, I would say Spain,” Frontex chief Fabrice Leggeri told Welt am Sonntag newspaper.

Data released by the International Organisation for Migration showed that migrants arriving in Spain numbered 6,513 for first six months of 2017.

In comparison, Leggeri said 6,000 irregular arrivals in Spain were recorded in June this year alone.

“If the numbers keep rising like they are now, then this route will become the most significant,” said Leggeri.

Italy and Greece have until now recorded the biggest numbers of migrants crossing the Mediterranean to reach the European Union.

But with the route through Libya shutting down as the Libyan coast guard increases patrols, people smugglers are setting their sights westward.

IOM data showed that arrivals on the Spain coastline leapt almost three-fold from 2016 to around 22,000 in 2017.

Around half of the migrants are Moroccans, while others came from west African countries, said Leggeri.

EU member states last week reached a controversial plan to curb migrant and refugee arrivals from Africa and the Middle East.

The deal includes the creation of secure centres for migrants in the bloc, “disembarkation platforms” outside the EU and sharing out refugees among member states.

The accord came after Italy's new populist government pushed the issue to the forefront of the EU agenda by refusing to open the country's ports to migrant rescue ships.

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.

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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