MADRID, July 30 (Reuters) - Spain’s North African enclave of Ceuta is experiencing a humanitarian and security emergency after 1,500 migrants reached the city by swimming across from Morocco over the past week, the territory’s leader said on Thursday.
Ceuta, together with Melilla - another Spanish autonomous city located in North Africa - represents the European Union’s only land border with Africa. Both cities periodically experience surges in attempted crossings by migrants seeking to reach Europe.
Speaking in separate interviews with radio stations Cadena SER and Onda Cero, Juan Jesus Vivas said the recent influx had overwhelmed the city’s reception system and left hundreds of migrants sleeping outside.
“We are facing a situation of absolute humanitarian and social emergency,” Vivas told Cadena SER, adding that facilities for unaccompanied minors were operating at 2,400% of capacity.
In comments to Onda Cero, he described the situation as a national emergency and called for a “decisive, forceful, immediate and coordinated” response under a single command structure.
Spain’s Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska will travel to Ceuta on Friday to meet local authorities and security chiefs, as the Spanish government said it was coordinating across multiple ministries to strengthen border control and provide humanitarian assistance.
Arrivals were currently averaging about 300 people a day, according to Vivas. At that pace, he warned, Ceuta could face a situation comparable to the May 2021 migration crisis, when 10,000 people entered the enclave in mere days.
Vivas also pointed to the human cost of the crossings, saying 60 bodies had been recovered at sea in recent months, and argued that stronger migration controls would help prevent further deaths.
The interior ministry said Moroccan security forces were helping to curb arrivals from its territory.
Vivas called for changes to Spain’s immigration framework, saying legal shortcomings exposed by a recent Supreme Court ruling needed to be addressed.
Earlier this month, the Supreme Court ruled that migrants intercepted at sea while attempting to reach Ceuta or Melilla cannot be summarily returned under the enclaves’ special border-rejection regime.
(Reporting by Emma Pinedo; Editing by David Latona and Toby Chopra)
