Spain’s leading far-right politician arrived in the territory on Sunday, fueling tensions there after thousands of migrants entered the exclave last week.
The far-right politician Alvise Pérez, center, faced off against residents after in Ceuta, Spain, after speaking out against the influx of migrants there.
Most of the people who surged into Spain on Thursday have since returned to Morocco. A small minority are holed up on a seafront, tired, hungry and vowing to stay.
Some migrants were waiting it out on a beach in Ceuta, a Spanish territory, on Saturday after crossing from Morocco days earlier.
Our Madrid bureau chief, Jason Horowitz, visits the coastal town of Ceuta, a Spanish territory in North Africa where there has been an unprecedented influx of migrants crossing the border from Morocco.
Most of those who came to the territory, a Spanish exclave in Africa, have returned across the border to Morocco. At least 67 people died trying to enter, the authorities said.
On Thursday, tens of thousands of Moroccans broke into Ceuta, a Spanish territory that neighbors Morocco. By Friday evening, most of them had left, hungry and disappointed.
Migrants near the Spain-Morocco border on Friday. Tens of thousands of people illegally entered the Spanish territory of Ceuta this week, though by Friday’s end most had returned.
Speculation has focused on lax Moroccan policing, attractive Spanish immigration policies and misinformation from human traffickers. In reality, experts said, it’s too early to know.
Several migrants said they had been motivated by social media messages claiming that the Spanish border was open, though the origin of those messages remained unclear.
The crossing of 50,000 people to Spanish territory this week has created a crisis for the Spanish government, much as the 2015 migration crisis did for Europe’s leaders. The context is different.
Several migrants who crossed into Ceuta attributed their arrival to lax Moroccan border protocols. But Europe’s anti-immigrant politicians blamed Spain’s migrant-friendly policies.
The peninsula on Morocco’s northern coast, which Spain has governed for centuries, has been a frequent site of mass migrant crossings and political tensions.
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