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CEUTA: Increase in asylum applications

01 January 1998

According to the Spanish Commission for Aid to Refugees (CEAR), 120 asylum applications have been received in the enclave of Ceuta in the year since February 1997, of which 50 per cent have been allowed to go forward for processing. In January 1998 the number of applications was up by half on the previous year, as a result of the political instability in several African countries. During 1997 the Guardia Civil in Ceuta detained a total of 526 immigrants attempting to reach the Spanish coast in 113 small craft. Those arrested had come from various parts of Morocco. The 1996 figures were 837 arrests, from 54 boats.

The explosive situation in Ceuta and Melilla, which between them had at year-end 1,340 immigrants detained in squalid conditions, led the Spanish government to decide that all the detainees should be removed to the mainland in order, it said, to "re-set the counter at zero". The transfer operation, started in December, was expected to be completed in early February. However this contingent did not include the Algerian citizens (260, all in Melilla) whom the Spanish were trying to return to their country. Those affected are pressing strongly for their inclusion in the group being transferred to the mainland.