The decision to suspend Eid Al-Adha 2020 taken by the local authorities in Ceuta is not to the liking of the city’s Muslims. The same goes for the ban on importing sheep from Morocco to Melilla where the festival will be celebrated.
While 3,151 people have been repatriated from Spain, Ceuta, Melilla, and Algeria as of June 20, 2020, many foreigners residing in Morocco and stranded abroad are still waiting to be repatriated.
Miriam El Majjaoui Val, a 25-year-old Spanish woman, has been in Morocco since February 8 to visit her husband, and has been stranded there due to the closure of borders. She later discovered that she was pregnant.
Having left Morocco between January and March to join Huelva in Spain to participate in the strawberry campaign, five pregnant women got stranded there due to the closure of borders because of the Covid-19 health crisis. Unable to return, they had to give birth on site.
The spokeswoman for the Spanish government, Maria Jesus Montero, declared on Tuesday, June 30, that her country will only open its borders with Morocco under one condition.
The Spanish Federation of Fruit, Vegetable, Flower and Live Plant Producer and Exporter Associations (FEPEX) has once again attacked the Moroccan tomato.
The case of the young Moroccan Ilias Tahiri, who died under the same conditions as African-American George Floyd on July 1, 2019, in the Oria juvenile center in Spain, has reached the Spanish Parliament.
While Europe has decided to open its borders with Morocco on July 1st, Ceuta and Melilla want to derogate from the rule. The two Spanish enclaves have decided to keep their borders with the kingdom closed until July 9th.
61 illegal immigrants were living in unsanitary conditions in basement warehouses in Madrid. Several Moroccan women and children were being held by a human trafficking and illegal immigration network.
473 dirhams per day, or 14,201 dirhams per month. This is the income of Moroccan seasonal workers in the Spanish strawberry fields, of which 8.33% is deducted by the state in the form of income tax.
The working conditions of seasonal workers are deplorable. In a message published on the United Nations (UN) website, the UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights (OHCHR), Olivier De Schutter, invited the Madrid government and Spanish companies on Friday to improve the deplorable conditions of migrants deployed in the strawberry fields as "essential workers".
The epidemiological situation of covid-19 in Morocco is under control and stable, according to a press release from the Ministry of Health. Unless there is a last-minute turnaround, the kingdom should open its borders as early as mid-July, after the lifting of the state of health emergency, announced for July 10.