MADRID, Spain – Nearly a month and a half after the mass entry of migrants into Ceuta that has caused an unprecedented crisis in the autonomous city’s recent history, thousands of people remain camped in improvised settlements, while desperation is driving many of these migrants into daily fights and robberies. In addition to the illegal camps installed on Playa del Trampolín and the Tarajal warehouses, Benítez beach has now been added, with more than a hundred shanties erected on Saturday by Moroccans in an irregular situation in an extension of settlements advancing alongside the desalination plant.
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The improvised settlements occupy much of the Benítez curve, next to the desalination plant that separates this beach from Trampolín, where thousands of migrants have been living since the start of the crisis. By Saturday morning more than 100 structures could already be counted, while other migrants continued gathering reeds, cardboard, fabric and other materials to erect new shanties. The occupation of Benítez adds to the situation that has prevailed for approximately a month on Playa del Trampolín, with the president of Ceuta estimating on Friday that around 4,500 people remain settled in this area.
The new settlements have also spread along the breakwaters of Benítez and currently reach the vicinity of the stairs where a group of Ceuta residents descended weeks ago to burn the few huts that had been installed there at that time. Tension in the areas most occupied by migrants occurs both during the day and especially at nightfall. In addition to the fire in the Tarajal shanties, the night from Friday to Saturday was marked by the constant of brawls and robberies.
Migrants mainly use reeds, cardboard, fabric and tape to build improvised shelters in which to spend the night, with some settlements located just metres from the shore and others erected in a second line of beach. On Saturday, several migrants were also using the public showers of Benítez, surrounded by the shanties. The situation persists despite the Municipal Ordinance on the Use and Exploitation of Ceuta’s Beaches prohibiting camping and the installation of tents or similar structures on the beaches, as well as the lighting of fires, with these behaviours contemplated as infractions in municipal regulations.
Migrants have also been observed cooking using improvised fires made with stones and frying pans while awaiting a place in the resources enabled to address the situation arising from the mass arrival of migrants, with authorities allowing migrants to carry out these illegal actions on the grounds of the humanitarian emergency. Meanwhile, Ceuta has experienced another night of tension after the previous one ended with 42 shanties burned in the migrant settlement next to the Tarajal industrial estate. New incidents and confrontations in different parts of the autonomous city, such as the Chorrillo area and the Tarajal warehouses, have left at least eight detained and three injured by bladed weapons, one of them more seriously and still hospitalised.
The National Police has detained eight people, six of them from Ceuta and two migrants, for their alleged participation in these incidents originating in different areas and related to robberies with violence, injuries and threats. The most serious event occurred around 11pm in the area of the Chorrillo beach esplanade, a heavily trafficked location, where there were five detainees for robbery with violence and two injured. As a consequence of a mugging, one of the victims suffered more serious bladed weapon wounds and had to be transferred to the University Hospital of Ceuta with several deep cuts, while another minor was lightly injured in the hand and the third victim escaped unharmed.
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In the same area of the Tarajal warehouses, several incidents occurred due to fights among the migrants settled there, resulting in one person injured by a bladed weapon in the side. These events occurred in parallel with several fires recorded during the night, including that of a vehicle near the Príncipe Felipe school and that of a container in the peripheral Hadú neighbourhood.
