Ceuta, Spain. The Spanish government said it will deploy military units to reinforce police in Ceuta after migrants crossed from Morocco on Thursday, overwhelming the Guardia Civil force.
Video footage showed hundreds of migrants swimming from the Moroccan side using inflatable inner tubes and other flotation devices, while others broke through a gate in the border fence and ran into the city.
Security deployment
The Interior Ministry said three platoons of 20 soldiers each, a diving unit and a military vessel would be deployed by Friday.
Special police intervention units would also be reinforced to a total of 200 personnel, the ministry said.
A Guardia Civil spokesperson said migrants were entering “massively from the sea” through the Tarajal breakwater and that police had been overwhelmed, but did not provide an estimate of the number of arrivals.
State television TVE reported that between 2,000 and 3,000 people had crossed, although Reuters was not immediately able to confirm the figure.
Local response
The Ceuta regional government had called on Madrid to deploy the army to guarantee safety and close the border with Morocco.
Many local shops closed. Enrique Serrano, who runs a women’s clothing store in central Ceuta, said business owners were organising to protect their property and families because they believed police resources would be insufficient.
“I’m not opening this afternoon because the situation is extremely tense … The first thing I have to do is protect my business and my family,” he told Reuters.
Serrano said that after the fence was breached after midnight, hundreds of migrants entered within minutes.
Previous crossings
The incident recalled a crossing in 2021, when about 10,000 people from Morocco and sub-Saharan Africa, many of them minors, entered the enclave of around 85,000 residents over several days.
Ceuta and Melilla, another Spanish autonomous city in North Africa, form the European Union’s only land border with Africa. Both cities periodically experience increased attempts by migrants seeking to reach Europe.
