Some drowned and others got caught up in crush, official says, as incident prompts criticism by other EU nations
At least 34 people have died trying to reach the Spanish enclave of Ceuta after more than 40,000 migrants entered the tiny territory from Morocco in a matter of hours, triggering a political crisis for the Madrid government and unleashing a barrage of criticism from other EU countries.
The large influx of people arriving in Ceuta by swimming across from neighbouring Morocco or scaling the high border fence has caught the city of 85,000 off guard and resulted in what one local police association has called a “serious humanitarian crisis”.
Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, who arrived in Ceuta on Friday, described the influx as “a violation of Spain’s territorial integrity” and said he would use all the state resources at his disposal to guarantee the safety of the people of Ceuta.
Its not ‘marginalized people’ trying to ‘get their fair share’. Its normal citizens like you and me, who have grown absolutely desperate because the dire economic circumstances in their home countries.
Yes, these countries have been disadvantaged by capitalism and their colonial history, but their current day problems are as much an effect of of corruption, mismanagement, geography and a host of other factors.
Appropriating other people’s problems to serve your own ideological views only serves to polarize the argument.
Europe has very real ways of fixing the issues in the near abroad in a way that also strengthens the continent itself, but conservative and right-wing demagogues continue to frustrate any form of constructive dialogue. Don’t fuel the fire.