Spain: Five migrants killed trying to invade Melilla’s Spanish enclave from Morocco

LAST UPDATE: 19:59

Five African migrants were killed and 76 others were injured, 13 of them seriously, as they tried to cross into the Spanish enclave of Melilla, in northern Morocco, according to local authorities.

Morocco’s interior ministry said some of the victims were fatally injured when they fell from the security fence where they had climbed.

In addition, 140 members of Morocco’s security forces were injured, five of them seriously, when they intervened to prevent the mass entry of migrants into the enclave.

Nearly 2,000 migrants tried to enter the Spanish enclave of Melilla from Morocco this morning and 130 of them succeeded, in what is the first mass entry attempt since normalizing relations between Madrid and Rabat.

Spanish forces spotted “around 06:40, a group of migrants consisting of at least 2,000 people” approaching the border, a prefecture spokesman told AFP.

“A significant group of 500 people from sub-Saharan Africa” ​​entered the border checkpoint and “at least 130 people” managed to enter Melilla, he added.

Melilla and another Spanish enclave, Ceuta, located in northern Morocco, are the only EU land borders on the African continent and are often the target of entry attempts by migrants seeking to reach Europe.

“Clashes broke out overnight between Thursday and Friday between migrants and security forces,” Omar Naji of the Moroccan Human Rights Association (AMDH) told AFP, information that could not be confirmed by authorities at this time. .

Hasani Hospital in Nador, not far from Melilla, confirmed that it had received “many” members of the security forces as well as migrants from sub-Saharan Africa who had been injured.

This attempt to enter one of the two Spanish enclaves en masse is the first since the normalization of relations between Madrid and Rabat in mid-March after almost a year of diplomatic confrontation.

The controversy was sparked by the hosting in Spain of Polisario Front leader Brahim Gali in April 2021 in order to receive medical care for Covid-19.

Madrid has put an end to the crisis by publicly supporting Morocco’s plan for autonomy in Western Sahara, a former Spanish colony 80% controlled by Rabat but claimed by Algeria-backed Polisario.