Spain convenes National Security Council over migrant influx in Ceuta

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez will hold an emergency meeting of the National Security Council on Tuesday, August 25, over the migration crisis in Ceuta. Nearly a month ago, tens of thousands of migrants crossed the Spanish city’s border with Morocco.

This is reported by Politico.

The meeting will begin at 8:30 a.m. at the Moncloa Palace in Madrid. This is the first time since the crisis that Sanchez has convened the National Security Council, which includes members of the government and the heads of defense and intelligence agencies.

Previously, on August 7 and 17, the prime minister held online meetings with ministers, during which they discussed the situation in Ceuta and the authorities’ further actions.

In recent weeks, the opposition and other political forces have called on Sanchez to convene a National Security Council. The leader of the leftist Izquierda Unida party, Antonio Maillo, called such a meeting “extremely important” and urged the government to review relations with Morocco.

The Ceuta crisis began in late July, when tens of thousands of people crossed the border from Morocco in a single day. The massive influx of migrants forced Spain to deploy the military, as border guards were unable to cope.

Sanchez then arrived in Ceuta and called the mass border crossing an “attack” and a violation of Spain’s territorial integrity.

Most of the migrants eventually returned to Morocco, but thousands remained in Ceuta. According to the Spanish Interior Ministry, as of August 13, there were about 5,000 migrants there.

As a reminder, about 60 migrants reached the coast of mainland Spain by boat and landed on a beach in the province of Murcia in front of tourists.