Spain Prepares to Repatriate 100 Moroccans from Ceuta as Border Remains Closed

The government delegate in Ceuta, Salvadora Mateos, specified that Covid-19 cases continue to be recorded in Morocco and Spain, and that it would not be prudent to open the border now, let alone in March as she had announced. "We will have to wait for the health situation to improve," she added.

The delegate also informed that she is preparing to organize the repatriation of about a hundred Moroccans stranded in Ceuta, at their request. The latter had preferred to remain in Ceuta at the start of the crisis. But more than a year after the border closure, the wait seems long to them and they have expressed the wish to join their families in Morocco.

In Morocco, the inhabitants of Fnideq, overwhelmed by the situation, took to the streets twice in a week to demonstrate against the closure of the border. In solidarity, the taxi drivers of Ceuta announced that they will hold a sit-in at the border this Friday to deplore the situation and call on the government for support for the sector.