Police report contradicts Sánchez on migrant crisis in Ceuta

As recently as Monday, Prime Minister Sánchez claimed on Spanish radio that there is "no information whatsoever" to suggest that Moroccan police or security services were involved in the dramatic events of July 30-31, when around 80,000 migrants - most of them Moroccan - swam and waded into the exclave of Ceuta.

A day later, the report from the border police (CENIF) was leaked to El Español and El País. In it, the investigators accuse the Moroccan security forces of "completely failing" to intervene at the beginning of the crisis, while their presence at the border was significantly less than normal.

Moroccan police officers are also said to have "guided" the migrants:

"In interrogations and conversations, the migrants said, largely unanimously, that the Moroccan police were not only passive in their attempts to cross the border, but also encouraged them to enter by sea".

That information is consistent with what several migrants told DN's emissaries in connection with the events.

In the police report, which is based on a large number of testimonies, the conclusion is that it was not at all an "accident at work", as Sánchez's government made it appear, but a "planned operation" with the aim of preventing Spain from reacting in time.

Pedro Sánchez said on Thursday in Congress that Spain still needs to cooperate with Morocco, and that there is no evidence of intent, but that relations will now "change."

- We are reviewing the mechanisms for how we share emergency preparedness and must ensure that there are guarantees that what happened on July 30 can never happen again, said Sánchez, who will also ask the EU's border police Frontex to establish a permanent post in the exclave.

But in Ceuta, irritation is growing against the central government in Madrid, which many residents perceive as subservient to the Moroccan king, Mohamed VI.

On Wednesday, large demonstrations were held in both Ceuta and Madrid, demanding clearer political action and more support to take care of the at least 5,000 migrants still remaining in the exclave.

Morocco lays claim to Ceuta and Melilla – and in just the month since the migrant crisis, two ministers have brazenly recalled those claims. Morocco's ambassador has been summoned to the Spanish Foreign Ministry for a reprimand, according to Sánchez.

In total, at least 141 people drowned in the sea off Ceuta on July 30-31, according to the organization Caminando Fronteras, which compiles data from Spanish and Moroccan authorities.