Aschraf had tied several empty plastic bottles together to stay afloat.

“You have to understand me.

I don't want to go back, ”the 16 year old Moroccan pleaded with tears.

As soon as he was ashore on the beach in Ceuta, Spanish soldiers brought the boy back to the Moroccan border fence.

Hans-Christian Rößler

Political correspondent for the Iberian Peninsula and the Maghreb, based in Madrid.

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    A journalist from Reuters news agency filmed the scene two weeks ago; at that time, more than 8,000 Moroccans stormed into the Spanish city after the border police had withdrawn. Now the recordings are evidence for the Ceuta public prosecutor's office, which has opened an investigation after a local organization has reported it. Aschraf had tried in vain to get into the Spanish exclave twice in just 48 hours.

    The Spanish Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska reiterated that vulnerable minors would not simply be sent back, as happened just under two weeks ago with thousands of Moroccans on the basis of a readmission agreement with Rabat.

    After the complaint about Aschraf's deportation, the human rights organization “Fundación Raíces” also informed the public prosecutor about further illegal express deportations.

    Amnesty International had previously reported that larger groups of minors had been returned immediately.

    Children wander the streets

    Human rights activists have been condemning the Spanish crackdown on the fences around Ceuta and Melilla for years. In March 2020, however, the European Court of Human Rights declared these “hot” deportations, as they are also known in Spain, to be legal. However, vulnerable minors who first have to be heard are excluded from this. The fear of being brought home means that many Moroccan children and young people still wander the streets of Ceuta.

    There are new raids every day to find them and bring them to one of the three reception facilities. Most of them are provisionally housed in the halls of an industrial area behind the border fence. The Spanish police said they had identified 920 minors by Sunday. More than 4,000 concerned Moroccan parents have already called a hotline in Ceuta to find out if their children are in town. So far, only 200 are to be brought to the peninsula. But this is only about the children and young people who were in Ceuta before the latest rush.

    But the Spanish regions are reluctant to accept them. In Andalusia, the government alliance was temporarily in danger when the right-wing populist Vox party refused to accept 13 minors. The conservative Madrid regional government does not want to do that either. Hundreds of minors were among the almost 23,000 migrants in the Canary Islands last year; this year their share increased. Most of them come from Morocco. The Spanish authorities allowed a good 2,000 vulnerable women and minors to travel to the Iberian Peninsula by spring.

    The crisis with Morocco, which has been using migrants as leverage for years, does not seem to be over yet. While the government in Madrid tries to relax, new allegations and threats come from Rabat. Spain has undermined "mutual trust" and lacked respect, said a government spokesman in Rabat. The Moroccan ambassador in Madrid threatened with new "consequences".