The investigation by Morning Express with Lighthouse Reports, which reveals how Morocco, Mauritania and Tunisia use European financing to detain and forcibly displace migrants and refugees, has led Sumar to question his government partner over the migration policies of the EU. This Thursday, Yolanda Díaz’s formation registered a series of questions in Congress that aim to clarify the role and degree of responsibility of Spain in the development of these practices.
The journalistic work reveals how the police and military forces of these countries detain and abandon people of sub-Saharan origin in deserts. The objective of these practices is to prevent them from reaching Europe, as part of the EU’s migration strategy, which funds these countries to control migrant routes on the African continent. The investigation also shows that Brussels has known about these operations for years, and that they are also carried out with the financing and material support provided by the EU, in a dispersion strategy in which Spain plays a leading role.
Spain, specifically, provides logistical support (police personnel, vehicles, training and technology) through the FIIAPP (International and Ibero-American Foundation for Administration and Public Policies (FIIAPP) – dependent on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs – and the Ministry of the Interior. In the registered questions, Sumar questions how many vehicles, supplies and personnel Spain provides to these countries; as well as what activities this logistical support is intended for, within the migration agreements with the EU or with Frontex.
Not in vain, Spain is a pioneer in signing agreements to finance countries of origin and transit so that they stop those who try to reach Europe. The first agreements date back to canoe crisis of 2006 in the Canary Islands, with the Government of the socialist José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, and they continue to this day. Over the years, funding has increased, and this strategy has been presented in Brussels as a recipe for success against irregular immigration. Since 2015, Europe has signed agreements with Turkey, Libya, Tunisia, Morocco and, recently, with Mauritania and Egypt; with the particularity that these are states questioned for their deficiencies in respect for fundamental rights.
The rest of the questions revolve around the actions that the Government of Spain intends to take to guarantee the cessation of any collaboration with these human rights practices; or to facilitate and ensure safe and respectful migration for people passing through the aforementioned countries. It is also questioned whether the Spanish Government has documentation or photographs that demonstrate the abandonment of migrants abandoned in remote areas by the Mauritanian authorities, such as those revealed in said investigation.
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Sumar’s candidate for the 9-J European elections, Estrella Galán, shared a message on her Instagram account this Wednesday. x in which he assured that its formation will require a commission of inquiry in the European Parliament to settle responsibilities and denounce the misuse of community funds. “The EU finances Morocco, Tunisia and Mauritania to forcibly detain migrants. Since 2003 we have had evidence of these practices, and in these 20 years, they have not only stopped, but have been systematized. In the same message, Galán has assured that they will demand surveillance mechanisms to “guarantee” that the EU respects human rights, “increasingly violated,” according to the candidate.
During the presentation of his program for the European elections, Galán explained Sumar’s position regarding the European migration pact closed last December by the member states, and which toughens the reception requirements for migrants. Sumar considers that the new European migration policy is a “threat against human rights”, and advocates the closure of the CIE, pursuing illegal returns and ending the “externalization” of borders in its program.
The Basque Parliamentary Group in the Senate will also ask the Government, in the Control session next Tuesday, how it assesses the reports of abandonment of migrants in the Sahara desert.
Just over two weeks before the European elections, the issue of migration is not the only issue that has highlighted the differences between the government partners in recent days. After the failure of the bill for the abolition of pimping proposed by the PSOE – and which did not have the support of Sumar -, the majority partner has withdrawn this Thursday the project on the land law that Congress had planned to debate first hour due to the lack of support, and which Sumar’s spokesperson, Íñigo Errejón, has described as “a hit law more typical of the path that Aznar marked.” Furthermore, Sumar has urged the PSOE to withdraw its ambassador from Israel, as has been done in Argentina following the controversial visit of President Javier Milei, all of this after the Israeli diplomatic response to Spain’s recognition of the Palestinian state, scheduled for next May 28.
