In 2021, the Spanish Government proposed as an absolute priority in terms of security that the new NATO road map – which was to be set at the Madrid summit – included for the first time the importance of the threats coming from the southern flank: terrorism, irregular immigration or the political use of energy resources. And he succeeded.
Now the Executive of Pedro Sánchez, who will once again be placed in the international epicenter during the Spanish presidency of the community club during the second semester of this year, has set as “highest priority” to achieve the European migration pact with two perspectives: security and foreign cooperation.
The Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, has held meetings with his European counterparts to address the agreement on the premise that “migration is not a problem, but a challenge for Europe that will persist throughout the next decades”, according to the words of the head of the Interior himself. In these trips, in which he asked the Member States for “generosity”, the minister was able to see the differences between the northern and southern partners.
The Spanish Government, according to close sources, are aware of “the enormous difficulties there are to carry out the pact”. But they believe that “it is possible”. And that is why they will put in the maximum effort so that the agreement is initialed during the next semester. His main card? The migration policy deployed by the Sánchez Government itself, based on collaboration with the southern neighboring countries of origin and transit of migratory flows arriving in Spain. The words of President Sánchez after his interview in Rome with Giorgia Meloni must be interpreted in this sense: “What we need to do is talk less about the internal dimension of migration and talk more about the external dimension of migration”.
This external dimension to which Sánchez alluded, in the case of Spain, has its own name: Morocco. The latest figures on irregular immigrants entering Spain will be the proof of conviction that the Spanish Executive will use to validate its position. And when relations go well with Rabat, this has an immediate effect on irregular immigration.
The data is this. During the first two months of 2022, when relations with the neighboring country remained tense, the total number of immigrants who had arrived in Spain by sea and land was 73.2% more than during the same period in 2021. The curve it kept going up. The continuous increase in the flow on the Canary route, one of the deadliest, was particularly striking, which at that time rose by 90%. However, after Pedro Sánchez and King Mohamed VI sealed the reunion between countries – in exchange for Spain’s turn on the autonomy of the Sahara -, the statistics were turned upside down. The latest data, published this week by the Interior Ministry, show that 4,287 people entered Spain irregularly in 2023, compared to 8,727 in 2022. A 50.9% decrease.
Figures that the Spanish Government wants to highlight despite the fact that they were clouded last summer with the tragic jump over the Melilla fence in which at least 23 immigrants lost their lives as a result of the brutality with which they act the Moroccan gendarmes. But this episode, the Executive of Sánchez gives it as closed once the Prosecutor’s Office has decided not to open an investigation. The ministry headed by Marlaska is clear that police cooperation with Morocco is key to fighting criminal organizations that traffic in immigrants.
In addition to having all the diplomatic channels open between the countries, the Spanish Government will spearhead the idea that migration policy will also depend on the importance of aid in international cooperation. In 2021, with the disagreement between Madrid and Rabat, the Interior granted 140,128 euros for police cooperation in Morocco. In 2022, the year in which the new stage was signed, more than 30 million euros were given in aid of this kind. This is clear from a response from the Government itself to the EH Bildu deputy in Congress, Jon Iñarritu. And not only in countries with which it shares a border. Mauritania received more than ten million euros last year and Senegal a little more than three. Numbers that the recipient countries find insufficient.
The focus of the security area, for the second semester, is on the intended new European legal framework, which should respond to the current phenomenon, with an equitable distribution. But this will not be the only priority that is put on the table. From this round of contacts, Marlaska has also extracted the need to prioritize the fight against organized crime, which has become a matter of State in the Netherlands or Belgium, where traffickers have become real professional syndicates . At the summit of Ministers of the Interior to be held at the end of July in Logronyo, Marlaska will offer experiences such as the Special Security Plan for Campo de Gibraltar as an example to advance the fight against this cycle.
