The Government will concentrate the new distribution of immigrants who have arrived in the Canary Islands aboard cayucos in recent weeks in three communities.. Specifically, the accommodation of around 3,750 people is planned in prefabricated facilities and provisional camps located on military lands in the Carabanchel district of the capital and the town of Alcalá de Henares (Madrid), Cartagena (Region of Murcia) and Mérida. (Estremadura).
The announcement was made this Tuesday by the Minister of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration, José Luis Escrivá, in the information meeting of at least four hours that he held by videoconference with representatives of the main cities, the president of the Spanish Federation of Municipalities and Provinces (FEMP), María José Pelayo, and with the counselors with powers in social policies to address this unprecedented crisis since 2006. In the month of October alone, more than 13,000 arrivals have been recorded on the coasts of the archipelago.
The forecast is that Madrid will welcome 1,220 immigrants at the Arteaga General Headquarters in Carabanchel next week and another 1,134 at the Primo de Rivera Barracks in Alcalá de Henares within two weeks.. The president of the community, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, has accused the Government of turning the Canary Islands “into a corridor for the mafias” that profit from migration, which, she has warned, know that “the season is open in Spain.”
In addition, another 800 people will be transferred to an unspecified center in Mérida, whose first phase is already underway, and 600 more to the old Naval Hospital in Cartagena starting next Monday.. In the Ministry of Inclusion they specified that “the search and conditioning work for new spaces continues” in collaboration with Defense that “shortly will result in new available places.”
The urgency of the municipalities and the autonomies that this Tuesday expressed their concern in the videoconference with Escrivá is justified mainly by the constant trickle of boats that arrive, day after day, to the Canary coasts. Yesterday there were 212 immigrants rescued in two cayucos, all near the island of El Hierro, all in good health after having spent about 10 days at sea before being towed to the port of La Restinga.
“Expulsion order”
Sources present at the meeting indicate that the minister explained that unaccompanied minors will stay on the islands, unless their social services cannot care for them, while adults will be transferred to the Peninsula with “an expulsion order.”. The interlocutors of this newspaper showed their reluctance that this document is actually a “letter of return”, which, they point out, “allows the settlement in Spain after two years.”
Although total figures were not provided for the number of immigrants who have been relocated in this crisis, in Catalonia alone since October 14 it amounts to 1,376. The Generalitat has demanded a “clear quota system for distribution between the different territories” and “co-decision” with those that have “the greatest volume of reception.”
The communities, especially those of the PP, continue to demand that the minister call a sectoral immigration conference to address the crisis and be able to make decisions – since this Tuesday's meeting was merely informative – a forum that has not been held for five years. even though it should be done twice a year. The commitment of Escrivá's team is to call it soon.