Moroccan security forces said on Saturday they had prevented hundreds of people from crossing into Ceuta. Reports say the group, mostly of sub-Saharan African origin, was hiding in the suburb of Fnideq, known in Spanish as Castillejos.
Moroccan media say 294 people were arrested, 46 of them Moroccans and the rest from Sub-Saharan Africa.
According to Moroccan security sources cited by the EFE news agency (source in Spanish), the incident occurred in a mountainous area southwest of Ceuta, where officers intervened to disperse the group.
The same reports said that the migrants remain in the area and that, for the time being, there have been no new attempts to approach the border fence.
Chami Edine Yakoub, 25, a Sudanese migrant hoping to cross into Ceuta, told AFP he had been looking for opportunities. “In Ceuta, in Europe, people are better looked after,” he said. “There are no jobs here. There is no money. There is no shelter. There is absolutely nothing, I swear.”
This latest attempt comes just two weeks after a mass crossing of some 72,000 men, mostly Moroccans, crossed into Ceuta, a Spanish territory. The vast majority of them have now returned to Morocco.
The city center of Fnideq woke up to a quiet morning on Saturday, albeit under a heavy police presence. Authorities say they have set up checkpoints on the main roads leading into the city, especially on the roads coming from Tetouan and Tangier.
During the early hours of the morning, surveillance was increased on land and at sea around the border with Ceuta, with the participation of fast boats from the Royal Moroccan Navy and surveillance drones.
Despite the operation, a 17-year-old woman managed to reach Castillejos overnight and told EFE that she had traveled from Tetouan on a bus that was stopped at three checkpoints along the approximately 35 kilometers between the two cities, underscoring the extent of Morocco's control in the area.
Saturday's operation is part of a wider deployment organized by Rabat to prevent a mass crossing into Ceuta, which had been called for on social media.
The call came just weeks after the tragedy of July 30 and 31, when tens of thousands of people crossed the border on foot and by swimming towards the Spanish enclave. According to humanitarian organizations, this episode left at least 141 dead, one of the highest death tolls ever recorded on the border between Morocco and Spain.
