The number of migrants landing in the Canaries has broken all records this year. 41,425 people, the majority sub-Saharan, landed on one of the islands of the archipelago. The highest rate of arrivals was this month of November with 7,338 people. The Spanish government has sounded the alarm as reception centers there are saturated.
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With our correspondent in Madrid, Diane Cambon
The Canary Islands have become the first gateway for migrants to Spain. As Giorgia Meloni’s Italy hardened its borders, migratory pressure increased on theSpain.
According to the Spanish Ministry of the Interior, 610 illegal boats have managed to reach the seven islands of the archipelago since January, compared to 530 in 2023. This is without counting the dozens of canoes which have sunk at sea with at least their edges hundreds of migrants.
The situation of reception centers on the islands is on the verge of saturation. And it has also become a political headache for the government of Pedro Sanchez which puts pressure on regions led by the right to welcome migrants who have landed on the islands, and in particular unaccompanied minors.
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This Thursday, December 5, the left-wing executive and the conservatives must meet to address the subject again. But the People’s Party demands in exchange that Brussels deploy more patrols from Frontex, the European migration police, off the African coast to monitor departures. The right also accuses the government of Pedro Sánchez of provoking a call for borders by proceeding with a new regularization of undocumented immigrants.
Nearly 300,000 immigrants could be regularized each year for the next three years in order to fill the absence of workers in certain sectors of the Spanish economy.
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