Nearly Half of Migrants Face Violence While Transiting Through Morocco, Study Finds

According to 2017 figures, while 92% of people who reached Spain passed through Morocco, 48% said they had been victims of violence there, especially around Ceuta and Melilla.

The CSIC writes: "These allegations regularly report police harassment and forced relocations to other places in Morocco, carried out by the national authorities who arrest them near Ceuta and Melilla, and transport them by bus to areas near the Mauritanian and Algerian borders."

In total, 941 violent incidents, of which 563 people were victims (sometimes in two different countries), were perpetrated by: the police (52%), unknown persons or common law criminals (23%) and traffickers (21%).

The Huffpost writes on this subject: "Among the violence suffered, physical (39%), mental (33%), discriminatory (20%) violence, gunfire or shooting threats (19%), kidnappings (16%), or even sexual violence (3%, of which 10% women) are cited."

But Morocco is not the only country concerned. The Tamanrasset region in Algeria would be the scene of countless abuses against migrants, "where cases combining kidnapping, forced labor, physical violence or even gunfire have been denounced."