ight hundred and sixty-two: that is the number of unaccompanied foreign minors still in Sebta, nearly three weeks after some 70,000 people entered the Spanish enclave in early August. The city, according to Euronews, is running its reception facilities for isolated minors at 2,872 percent of capacity, and many of the children are still sleeping outdoors for lack of care. Rabat, for its part, says it has received Royal Instructions addressed to the Interior and Foreign Affairs ministries to work toward identifying these children with a view to their return home, alongside its Spanish and European partners.
A Moroccan diplomatic source, cited by Le360, dismisses as “fallacious and unfounded” any accusation that Morocco refuses to cooperate: what is slowing the operation, the source says, are administrative and judicial obstacles on the Spanish side. Madrid, meanwhile, has released 25 million euros for the children’s care and is preparing to disperse them across seventeen autonomous communities, a plan several Vox and Popular Party-led regions have already said they will contest. The Civil Guard, for its part, opened a dedicated point on Tuesday for Moroccan families of people who went missing during the crossing, with a message delivered in Darija. Sebta will count its children before it returns them; for now, the count does not close.
Photo: Mario Sanchez Bueno, CC BY-SA 2.0.
