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Poor Africans risk everything to enter Spanish territory

African immigrants defied increased security to stage another rush at the border between Morocco and a Spanish enclave yesterday, the fifth in a week, the Interior Ministry office in Melilla said.

The ministry gave no figures, but the national news agency Efe said around 100 men divided into two groups tried to climb two razor-wire fences separating Morocco from Melilla and that around 40 managed to get into Spain.

They crossed over from a hillside pine forest in Morocco at a spot where both fences are 3m high. Crews raising the innermost fence to twice that height along the 10km border had yet to start work at this area.

Africans seeking to escape the poverty of sub-Saharan Africa have staged 10 runs across the border since late August.

Many took a year or more to travel to Morocco from their home countries so they could try to cross into Spain, which they see as a gateway to Europe and the prospect of a better life.

On Tuesday last week two groups estimated at 500 men each tried to enter Melilla and about 300 succeeded. They did so at two areas where the fence was yet to be raised.

On Thursday last week an estimated 500 people tried to cross the fence at Ceuta, another Spanish enclave 500km to the west, and five died, all five suffered gunshot wounds and both countries are investigating the incident.

Monday saw a huge wave of 650 at a spot in Melilla where the inner fence had in fact been elevated, and the government said that 350 made it in.

Some 135 were injured, either through cuts while climbing the razor wire or when they jumped from the top down into Spanish territory.

Spain now says it plans a third barrier to enhance security in Melilla, a small, crowded and centuries-old enclave located on Morocco's northeast coast.
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