More than 1.5 000 migrants have reached Spanish Ceuta in fresh days, mainly by sea. The reception centres are overloaded and the city authorities request Madrid to declare an emergency and establish a unified command. Europe sees one more time the cost of a border that the state cannot effectively control.
The border has stopped working.
Spanish Ceuta was under severe migration pressure. As reported by the Associated Press agency, hundreds of people tried to scope the autonomous city of tides from the coast of Morocco. Juan Jesús Vivas, president of Ceuta's authorities, reported on July 30 that over 1.5 000 people have arrived in fresh days, including adults and minors.
Some migrants bypassed breakwater marking the border in the El Tarajal area. On Thursday, thousands of people crossed the border on ft and by sea, as described by the Spanish paper “El País”. Border services and the local admission strategy were overloaded. This is no longer an average seasonal increase in the number of trials. The state lost full control of the section of its own border.
Ceuta demands Madrid's response
The autonomous city authorities are talking about an emergency. Vivas demanded that the crisis be regarded as a national emergency and that a unified command be established to coordinate the activities of administrations, services and reception centres. It besides calls for greater engagement of the Spanish and European Union governments.
The Centre for the Temporary Residence of Immigrants in Ceuta is incapable to accept all recently arrived. According to the study “El País” any people stayed outside the center, in makeshift camps. The problem besides includes custody of minors. deficiency of border control rapidly turns into a crisis of security, administration and public finances.
Madrid and Rabat announced a strengthening of cooperation on 30 July. The Spanish Ministry of the Interior informed that it had agreed on measures to make it possible to transfer Morocco to Ceuta illegally. The declaration will only substance if it translates into effective border protection and efficient return procedures.
Lesson of the Crisis of 2021
Current events evoke the crisis of May 2021. In 2 days, more than 8,000 people entered Ceuta. This occurred during Spain's sharp diplomatic dispute with Morocco. This experience has shown that migration flows can become a tool of force between countries.
There is no reason to attribute the current influx of deliberate Rabat operations without evidence. It is, on the another hand, the work of Madrid to check why the safety was again insufficient. A country that makes border protection dependent on the goodwill of its neighbour exposes its own citizens to hazard and loses political freedom.
This year, force has increased before. According to data from the Spanish Ministry of Home Affairs cited by the AP by 15 July, nearly 3,000 migrants reached Ceuta by land or sea. So the scale of the problem was visible before the last wave of crossings.
Rate for Poland
Ceuta lies far from Warsaw, but it offers a simple lesson for Poland. The external border must be protected by the State and asylum procedures must not replace control over who enters and how. Humanitarian aid to people in danger is an obligation. It is besides a real work to hold illegal crossings and enforce return decisions in compliance with the law.
Poland knows migration force on its east border. It should so take care of its own competences, efficient services and physical safeguards, alternatively of giving decisive decisions to the EU institutions. European solidarity makes sense as state support for border protection. It cannot be an order for the automatic distribution of the effects of another people's negligence to another countries.
The crisis in Ceuta reminds us of the basic thing: humanitarianism without border order ends in chaos, the costs of which are borne by residents, officers and migrants themselves.
