Spain vows to restore order after migrants influx from Morocco

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Tuesday vowed to re-establish order promptly following a sudden influx of migrants swimming into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta from Morrocco.
Spain deployed troops to Ceuta to patrol the border with Morocco after around 8,000 migrants, many from Sub-Saharan Africa and including some 1,500 minors, entered the enclave on Monday and Tuesday by swimming in or climbing over the fence.
Armoured vehicles guarded Ceuta’s beach on Tuesday, while soldiers and police used batons to clear migrants from the beach and threw smoke bombs to discourage others from crossing.
Spain said approximately 4,000 migrants had already been sent back to Morocco, under a readmission deal.
The regional leader of Ceuta criticised what he described as Morocco’s passivity in the face of Monday’s surge, and some independent experts said Rabat had initially allowed it as a means of pressuring Madrid over its decision to admit a rebel leader from the Western Sahara to a Spanish hospital.
“This sudden arrival of irregular migrants is a serious crisis for Spain and Europe,” Sanchez said in a televised address before his arrival in Ceuta.
European Commission Vice-President Margaritis Schinas tweeted that the enclave’s frontier was a European border, expressing his “full solidarity with Spain”.
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EU to improve cooperation with Morocco on migrants Ceuta, with a population of 80,000, is on the northern tip of Morocco across from Gibraltar. Along with another Spanish enclave, Melilla. It has long been a magnet for African migrants seeking a better life in Europe.

Edited by Olajumoke Adeleke