Olivia Burke
POLICE sources have warned some 50,000 illegal migrants from sub-Saharan Africa are waiting in Morocco to cross into Spain.
It comes after around 21,000 migrants have so far made the extremely dangerous journey across the sea to seek asylum in Europe.
Spain has become the number one point of migrant arrival in 2018, after the country’s socialist government gave the green light for open borders.
According to El Mundo, North Africa is becoming a ‘pressure cooker’, with at least 50,000 African migrants desperate to cross into the European country via the Strait of Gibraltar.
Human smugglers are apparently helping migrants bypass border controls in Morocco, with the promise that Spain is their ‘paradise’.
Police sources have even likened the concerning situation to the ‘Crisis of the Cayucos’, when thousands of migrants risked their lives in wooden boats called cayucos to reach Spain’s Canary Islands in 2006.
Migrants make their way to Morocco, cross through the Sahel area after paying the mafias, then elude the lax southern border controls in Morocco, revealed the El Mundo investigation.
Specialists believe this method is becoming more frequent and more violent, as the mafias’ desperate clientele reaches staggering numbers and continues to grow.
Just weeks ago, over 700 migrants stormed the fence separating Morocco from Spain’s north African enclave of Ceuta, which has been the most violent incident to date say the Guardia Civil.
Migrants came equipped with means to get around the concertinas, as well as using quicklime against agents guarding the border, injuring 22 while four suffered significant burns.
The Spanish Association of Civil Guards (AEGC) confirmed in a statement that the immigrants ‘sprinkled quicklime, excrement and rust’ on the agents and 22 have been treated for ‘chemical burns, inflamed eyes, bruises and respiratory disorders’.
