Symbolic imageMorocco says it has reinforced the borders with Ceuta and Melilla and made arrests after fresh online calls for mass crossings, while the EU Commission agreed a counter-disinformation tool with Meta and TikTok. Spain and Italy keep their border checks.
The Schengen Agreement lets people cross most EU internal borders without passport checks, and it has no mechanism for one member to expel or suspend another. Rome, under Giorgia Meloni's government, holds Spain responsible for migrants who reach the Spanish enclave of Ceuta in North Africa and travel onward; Madrid rejects the charge.
Morocco's interior ministry said on Wednesday it had reinforced security along the borders with the Spanish enclaves and made arrests after fresh social media calls for mass crossings. The European Commission announced a communication tool agreed with Meta and TikTok to counter the disinformation that fed the crossings of 30 and 31 July.
A study reported on Tuesday traces the mass entry into Ceuta to viral videos of the first crossings. Morocco is building a four-metre barrier near Fnideq.
Ceuta's mayor has demanded an internment centre for the thousands of migrants still in the enclave. Spain and Italy keep their border checks before a mass crossing called for 15 August.
Spain checked 199 arrivals from Italy at its six largest airports on Saturday, the first day of retaliatory controls. Rome calls the step unacceptable and keeps its own checks.
Spain began checks on air and sea arrivals from Italy at midnight on Saturday, answering Rome's suspension of Schengen free travel over the Ceuta crossings.
Spanish checks on travellers arriving from Italy took effect at midnight on Saturday and are to run until 7 September, Le Monde and the Guardian reported, a response to controls Italy introduced on 1 August for air and sea traffic with Spain after the rush on Ceuta. Madrid has threatened proportional measures and urged Rome to lift its controls no later than 9 August, according to TASS citing Reuters.
The European Commission has asked Meta and TikTok to strengthen monitoring and fact-checking after online reports of a supposed border opening preceded the rush of tens of thousands on Ceuta, the FAZ and Le Monde reported, citing digital commissioner Henna Virkkunen. TASS reports that Moroccan police were put on high alert and that the Spanish navy sent two additional frigates after posts circulated about a new mass crossing attempt.
Nearly a week after the mass crossing into Spain's enclave of Ceuta in late July, officials put the death toll at around 100. Up to 5,000 people remain in the city, and Morocco lists about 60 of its citizens as missing.
Hundreds of people gathered in the Moroccan town of Fnideq this week, holding up photos of relatives missing since some 72,000 people crossed into Spain's enclave of Ceuta late last month. Officials now put the death toll close to 100.
Italy has suspended Schengen free movement at its border with Spain over last week's mass crossing into Ceuta. At an emergency videoconference on Tuesday, EU interior ministers closed ranks behind Madrid instead.
EU interior ministers held emergency talks on Tuesday over last week's mass crossing into Spain's North African enclave of Ceuta. A Spanish forensic commission has put the death toll at 77.
Tens of thousands of people crossed from Morocco into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta on Thursday and Friday, and most have since gone back. EU interior ministers hold emergency talks on Tuesday after Italy and Denmark demanded Spain's temporary suspension from Schengen.
The death toll from last week's mass crossing into Spain's North African enclave of Ceuta has risen to at least 72, up from 67. Most of the tens of thousands who got in have since gone back to Morocco.
EU interior ministers will hold an urgent videoconference on Tuesday over the Ceuta crisis, amid continued divisions in the bloc over the mass crossing of migrants into the Spanish territory in north Africa. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the EU had offered Spain support "from the first moment" and that "not a single person reached mainland Spain or rest of EU", after Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez condemned the "selfish, polarising" reaction of some countries; Bloomberg described Sánchez as isolated.
The number of people who drowned trying to reach Spain's North African enclave of Ceuta has risen to 67. EU interior ministers will meet in an extraordinary session on Tuesday.
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said Italy intends to suspend the Schengen Agreement with Spain, and Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares responded by summoning the Italian ambassador. Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said she had spoken with Giorgia Meloni and backed the proposal, Borrell said no EU country can unilaterally expel another from Schengen, and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen demanded "swift returns" of migrants from Ceuta and the dismantling of smuggling networks.