Search

Migrants and Refugees

Spain

LATEST UPDATES

20/02/2024 – 12/03/2024

  • On March 10, 2024, in an interview with Diario Lanzarote, lawyer Dario Arencibia relayed his study on the criminal treatment of migration in Spain. It highlighted the structural dysfunctions of the judiciary in relation to the recurrent conflation of organised crime and migration.
  • On March 06, 2024, hunger strikes broke out in several locations in Spain. Asylum-seekers, in particular, are demanding appointments that have so far been denied to them. Dozens of these young people have mobilized in this way to demand that their cases be accelerated.
  • On March 06, 2024, a group of about 50 migrants trapped in the islet of Alboran were transported to Motril by the Spanish Guardia Civil, in the south of the Iberian Peninsula. In this inhospitable island, they had suffered harsh living conditions.
  • On March 05, 2024, nearly 70 migrants arrived from Mauritania off the island of El Hierro. The Spanish rescue services assisted 64 survivors. A significant part of the group was seriously injured during this long journey where 4 individuals died. 
  • On March 04, 2024, 142 people of Algerian and Moroccan origin were rescued from the islet of Alboran. Another 50 were still on the 600-metre-long military base when two people died.
  • On February 28, 2024, a boat that had set sail from northern Senegal sank while carrying more than 300 people who were likely heading to the Canary Islands. 24 bodies have been recovered but hundreds of people are in a state of disappearance.
  • On February 26, 2024, between 60 and 100 migrants attempted to swim to the enclave of Ceuta from Moroccan beaches. Exhausted but having entered the EU’s land space, the majority of these people have applied for asylum, according to local press reports. Since 2015, Spain has legalized the systematic pushback that has claimed the lives of dozens of migrants.
  • As of 21st February 2024, a 14-year-old unaccompanied minor of Gambian origin still didn’t have access to international protection in the city of Madrid. The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child has condemned Spain for its refusal to provide accommodation and schooling to protect this child.

For the period from June 2021 to May 2022, click here.