Spain’s migration minister on Thursday criticised the “xenophobic” reaction to the ongoing transfer of thousands of migrants from the Canary Islands to peninsular Spain.
Since the beginning of July, more than 16,000 migrants have crossed the sea from north-west Africa to Spain’s Canary Islands. This figure far exceeds the figures for the whole of 2022.
According to local media, Madrid plans to place 11 thousand migrants in the rest of Spain, due to the overload of services. Special centres will be created for migrants to live in hotels, hostels, military barracks throughout the country.
Salvador Escudero, a Popular Party councillor in the town of Torrox in Málaga, said on Wednesday that 240 migrants had already been housed for free in a local hotel. Escudero also suggested that migrants could spread diseases such as typhoid in Málaga. He told a local broadcaster:
“We don’t know what they’ll do. We do not know if they’ll take your wallet, rob a car, or if they’re going to try something else because they have nothing. If they don’t put a tag on them like they do for animals, I don’t know how much they’ll be able to control these creatures.”
Acting Migration Minister Jose Luis Escriva expressed his opinion on the comments:
“It’s so hard to digest, so detestable, that I’m speechless.”
Escudero is not the only right-wing Spanish politician not shy of such language. Juan Garcia-Gallardo, the vice president of Castile and Leon who represents the far-right Vox party, on Wednesday visited a hotel housing 183 migrants from his region.
In a video posted on X’s website, he said residents did not feel safe because of young male migrants. Garcia-Gallardo said the central government was to blame for fuelling the “invasion” of migrants.
At the same time, Isabel Diaz Ayuso, president of the Popular Party of the Madrid region, condemned the government for sending “more than 100 migrants in one night” and “without any communication”. She said during a speech Thursday:
“They are sending thousands of migrants to regional governments amid maximum fear for national security.”
Escriva accused the People’s Party of “xenophobia” and “political opportunism” and said Spain was handling the crisis “surprisingly sensibly”. He added that Spain had accepted 200,000 Ukrainian refugees in 2022 without much trouble. After the conflict in Israel erupted earlier this month, Spain raised its terror alert to level four on a five-point scale.
Earlier, the Italian island of Lampedusa faced a huge influx of migrants from Africa. It is the first port of call for many migrants who intend to enter the European Union.
