Riot police were deployed on the Moroccan side of the border with the Spanish Ceuta enclave, as migrants attempted to reach the city for the third night in a row.
Tensions at the border between Morocco and Ceuta, a Spanish enclave that shares a border with Africa, continued for the third night in a row.
Riot police were deployed to disperse people attempting to cross into Spain from Morocco after listening to a call on social media networks, according to authorities.
The Moroccan police used water cannons against the groups of young people, mainly Moroccans, who retaliated by throwing stones at the police.
Calls on social media asked people to head to Ceuta on Sunday to try and cross the border into Europe through Spain. Moroccan intelligence agency DGSN said in response in a post on Facebook that 60 people were arrested on suspicion of inciting a mass migration attempt.
On Monday, nine young people attempting to swim to Ceuta were intercepted and detained by Moroccan forces stationed at the border before they reached Ceuta’s Tarajal beach.
Meanwhile, on the Spanish side of the fence, both the Guardia Civil and the Spanish National Police remain on alert — although no action has been taken in the last few hours.
A long-time target for migration attempts
Scores of security personnel were deployed to the Moroccan border town of Fnideq to disperse groups of people who had heeded the calls on social media to breech the border fence.
Ceuta and Melilla — two tiny Spanish territories in North Africa bordering the Mediterranean — have long been targeted by migrants and refugees seeking better lives in Europe.
Many of those who had headed to the border were Moroccans of all ages including minors, and migrants from sub-Saharan Africa, Algeria and other places who have lived in the region and were waiting for the opportunity to cross into Europe, according to activists.
The Spanish Interior Ministry said on Monday that its own and Moroccan security efforts over recent days had brought the situation “under control”.
Nationwide, Moroccan security forces have stopped more than 45,000 migration attempts from January to early September, according to the Moroccan Interior Ministry.
In August alone, more than 11,000 migration attempts were prevented in the region around Ceuta and another 3,000 in the area around Melilla, the ministry said in a statement.
