With the beaches and coastal waters crowded with tourists and pleasure boats, the Balearic Islands have this weekend registered an annual record of arrival of immigrants by boat.

At least 178 irregular migrants have been intercepted in the last hours on the coast or in waters near the south of the archipelago, mainly in Mallorca.

It is the most intense arrival so far this year and one of the highest records since this migratory phenomenon began to intensify, before the pandemic.

The southern component winds and the calm coupled with the intense heat wave that is hitting the Mediterranean this week have been used again by the organizations dedicated to the illegal trafficking of people to exploit the maritime route between the northwest of Algeria and the south of the Islands.

It is the second consecutive weekend so far this month in which there has been a wave of small motorized boats, all with identical characteristics, with between 10 and 15 crew members on board, 50-horsepower outboard motors and a skipper who organizes the travel and work for the mafias.

In fact, in recent days the National Police have arrested three of these bosses, of Algerian origin and less than 30 years old. The investigation that led to his arrest began earlier this month, after Salvamento Marítimo received a desperate call for help from a boat that was adrift and completely disoriented after 40 hours of sailing. Although the vast majority of immigrants are usually male, among the crew of that drifting boat there was a woman with a girl of just 3 years of age. The Police were able to identify the bosses and arrest them for crimes of favoring illegal immigration and belonging to a criminal organization.

Mainly, the 'modus operandi' is always the same. The mafias use procurers in the places of departure of the boats (Algeria in the case of the Balearic Islands) that offer the route for amounts ranging between 1,000 and 2,500 euros. They capture immigrants in public places where they use word of mouth and agree on the price and departure dates, although they are always subject to weather conditions. Then they set sail taking advantage of the calm times and guided by two other members of the gangs: the bosses, who usually take advantage of their expulsion after their arrest in Spain to return to their country and organize new transfers; and other members who deal with logistics, including GPS.

The last batch recorded these days has left shocking images that have been captured by bathers and disseminated on social networks.

This is the case of a video recorded yesterday at mid-morning on the beach of Portals Vells, one of the busiest coves in the south of Mallorca, where dozens of boats and pleasure yachts anchor.

A bather recorded with his mobile the scene of the landing of one of these boats.

You can perfectly see how the person in charge of skipping the boat turns and flees after leaving the immigrants ashore.

An off-duty civil guard filmed the scene from a jet ski.

14 boats have arrived in two days and the emergency services and those in charge of applying police protocols are on the verge of saturation.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

Know more

See links of interest

  • Last News

  • Work calendar

  • Balearic Holidays

  • Home THE WORLD TODAY

  • Burnley - Brighton and Hove Albion

  • Chelsea - Crystal Palace

  • Everton - Southampton

  • Leicester City - Wolverhampton Wanderers

  • Celta de Vigo - Atlético de Madrid