The Spanish enclave of Ceuta in Morocco experienced the most serious migratory and institutional crisis in its history between Thursday 30 and Friday 31 July. At the time of going to press on Friday evening, nearly 60,000 Moroccans had forced their way across the border within 48 hours, taking advantage of failures in controls and insufficient security staff. By way of comparison, the previous crisis in May 2021 had seen only 10,000 arrivals.
In response to the emergency, the Spanish Ministry of the Interior deployed 3,000 soldiers to assist the Guardia Civil on the ground, supported by several emergency police forces. Although the EU offered its support as early as Thursday, Spain has so far made no request, whether for Frontex teams or for the Union Civil Protection Mechanism, according to one official.
In Ceuta, which has 83,000 inhabitants, this massive influx represented an increase of more than 50% in the total population, overwhelming all assistance services, reception centres and local hospital capacity. The saturation was such that it itself caused an early reverse flow of arrivals, faced with the lack of shelter and food: on Friday at 3 pm, the Spanish Ministry of the Interior was already recording nearly 37,500 returns to Morocco, taking place at a rate of 150 people per minute.
Spain denounces an “attack” by smuggling networks. Speaking to the press, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said the local authorities were “accelerating the repatriation of migrants who entered illegally” and that one of the priorities remained to prevent any departures to the European mainland.
He denounced an “attack” and a “violation of territorial integrity” of the country, attributing this crisis to the “self-serving” interpretation by smuggling networks of a judgment handed down by the Spanish Supreme Court three weeks ago. That judgment states that the accelerated pushback procedure applies only to those attempting to enter Ceuta and Melilla “by crossing the established border control arrangements”, excluding those who arrived by swimming.
In its ruling, however, the Court had stressed that “if containment arrangements were put in place at sea to protect the border”, nothing prevented this pushback from being applied “to those intending to cross the border irregularly by crossing those maritime containment arrangements”.
In that logic, the Spanish authorities are currently considering deploying buoys on the breakwater separating Ceuta from the Moroccan town of Fnideq (Castillejos), in order to create “a visual physical barrier”. The Spanish government is also not ruling out “changing certain aspects of the legislation in order to facilitate repatriation as efficiently as possible”, Mr Sánchez specified.
Morocco remains a “reliable partner”. While the Moroccan authorities are also being criticised — with some Spanish political figures accusing them of having encouraged the crossings in a logic of diplomatic “blackmail” — Mr Sánchez firmly defended the country, describing it as an “ally” during an address before the Ceuta Assembly. He welcomed “constant, fluid and very reasonable” exchanges between the two countries, “unlike what happened in 2021”.
The European Commission itself described Morocco as a “central and reliable partner” on the migration issue on Thursday evening. “The EU provides substantial support to Morocco, and full use should be made of it to prevent such events from happening again,” a European official stressed.
Morocco is said to be actively strengthening controls to prevent new departures and mobilising specific means of transport in order to readmit people returning to its territory, according to the same source.
Strong tensions between Member States. Elsewhere in the EU, reactions were swift: in an X post published on Friday, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni called for “Spain’s suspension from the Schengen area”, holding Mr Sánchez responsible for the situation after the recent regularisation of thousands of migrants in Spain.
That request was backed by Denmark and Finland, whose interior minister, Mari Rantanen, said that “Spain has completely failed to protect the external border of the Schengen area against intrusions”.
The European treaties do not allow the definitive expulsion of a partner country from the Schengen area. However, the Schengen Borders Code authorises the temporary reintroduction of controls at internal borders in the event of security threats or serious failings in border management. During the 2015-2016 migration crisis, the EU thus authorised several countries to reintroduce controls on movements coming from Greece, temporarily isolating the country.
In Spain, the Italian proposal was received very badly. José Luis Albares, Spain’s Foreign Minister, denounced on X an “inappropriate” statement by “a partner and friendly country, from which we expect European solidarity and not partisan demagoguery”. “After the arrival of more than 700,000 people from Libya, Italy received support from Europe, not moral lessons”, added Javi López, Vice-President of the European Parliament (S&D, Spanish), adding that “solidarity is not a one-way street”.
For its part, France has already strengthened its controls at the physical border with Spain by activating its Rapid Intervention Force.
In the face of concerns, the Commission was clear: at this stage, “no onward movement of migrants has been detected from Ceuta towards mainland Spain”. It also recalled that entry into the enclave does not give automatic access to free movement in the rest of the Schengen area, under Article 41 of the associated code. According to one official, a technical meeting with the Member States took place on Friday “so that everyone has the right information”.
In the coming weeks, the Commission is expected to rely on the SchEval monitoring mechanism in order to determine whether failings occurred at the Spanish borders. (Original version in French by Justine Manaud)