In the midst of the debate on immigration between the government and the PP, the data: 2,515. This is the number of irregular migrants that, according to Eurostat, Spain expelled in the first quarter of the year to their country of origin. With these figures, Spain occupies fifth place among the EU countries that have returned the most irregular migrants after France, Germany, Sweden and Cyprus. This is the highest figure since the same period last year, when Spain expelled 2,570 people.
The increase in arrivals of irregular migrants in the Canary Islands this summer (Between June and August, more than 2,600 people disembarked19.4% more than last year) has put the issue of immigration in the spotlight over which the government and the main opposition party clashed this week with a crossroads of accusations that have made headlines in the media. The President of the Executive, Pedro Sánchez, opened the week with a tour of Mauritania, Gambia and Senegal – key countries for Spain on the migratory route – to try to stop the departure of the cayucos to the Spanish coasts. A trip that the PP has described as “false humanitarian” and with which the government would only encourage irregular immigration and encourage the mafias to continue enriching themselves with human trafficking.
This is why the popular spokesman of the Congress, Miguel Tellado, introduced into the debate the “mass expulsions” of migrants who are already in Spanish territory. Faced with the criticism provoked by Tellado's harsh statements, his party colleague Borja Sémper tried to soften the blow: “That is inaccurate,” Sémper said in an interview with Euskadi radio. “What Tellado has done is to say that in Europe, as in Germany, immigration policies are proposed in this sense,” he said in reference to deportations and expulsions.
These expulsions, in compliance with the law, have already been carried out. Among the three Mediterranean countries most exposed to the arrival of irregular migrants from Africa, Spain is the one that has expelled the most people at the beginning of this year – latest data available – with a total of 2,515, well ahead of Italy (935) and Greece (1,195). Among those expelled, 530 are Moroccans, 265 Colombians and 155 Algerians, although there are other nationalities. Furthermore, almost 70% of these expulsions were “forced”, according to the community agency. The rest correspond to non-European citizens who, voluntarily and taking advantage of specific programs, for example Frontex, have decided to return to their country. Spain has not provided Brussels with disaggregated information on unaccompanied minors, another derivative on which the government and the PP have clashed, so these minors have not entered into community statistics.
Despite the data, the PP continued to accuse Sánchez of passivity, as well as the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, and the European Union itself. “Albares does nothing. Frontex does not act,” said popular MP Borja Sémper in an interview with Radio Euskadi. Faced with accusations from the PP that the government is facilitating the work of the mafias with its “call effect” of migration to Spain, Sánchez defended himself on Thursday by assuring from Senegal that regular migration “vaccinates against those who make irregular migration a business, such as the mafia, and against those who use it as a pretext to spread hatred and xenophobia in society,” he said, implicitly alluding to the extreme right. Two days earlier, during his visit to Mauritania and Gambia, the president had announced the return of migrants as “essential” while proposing “circular migration” programs through work contracts to encourage regular migration.
But the concept of “circular migration” has not been appreciated by government partners who have called it a euphemism. The secretary general of Podemos in Andalusia, Martina Velarde, has stressed that what is hidden behind this concept is in reality “suffering, work and sexual exploitation”. For his part, Sémper considered this Friday in an interview on Onda Cero “materially impossible” to reach an agreement with the Executive on immigration issues. A matter that, according to him, should be the responsibility of the State.
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This is precisely what the Minister of Defense, Margarita Robles, insisted on this Friday in a statement during a break in an informal council of European ministers from her region in Brussels. “It is unacceptable on the part of the PP, in an issue that is clearly a matter of state, that it can try to take advantage of it and make politics in this matter. “These are humanitarian issues that affect the essence of international relations,” Robles stressed, adding that immigration is also linked to economic and cultural issues. In addition, in his statements to the media, he also recalled that “jihadism is spreading through some African countries,” referring to the Sahel, a key point for Spain's security. “Not everything is worth it,” he told the PP about the fights that the opposition and the government have had this week.
On the other hand, during the first quarter of the year, 1,505 expulsion orders were issued, which places Spain in thirteenth place among the Twenty-seven. In this case, there is a sharp decrease compared to the same period in 2023, when 4,160 orders were issued for non-EU citizens to leave the country. In total, in 2023, 10,645 expulsion orders were issued, while in 2022 this figure was 10,920.