France has sent back to Spain nearly 10,000 irregular migrants between January and October this year, on average 1,000 a month.
Spain's north-western city of Irun at the border with France risks becoming a refugee camp because French police is sending back migrants attempting to cross into the country. As reported on the border between Italy and France, immediate expulsions are carried out without guarantees, often outside of the legal system, and migrants are abandoned on Spanish territory, according to a number of NGOs, as documented by footage broadcast by Basque television ETB.
Between January and October this year, France has sent back to Spain over 9,038 irregular migrants - on average 1,000 a month - or three times more than data released by the Spanish government with a 26 percent increase over the same period in 2017, according to data by French border police quoted by Spanish daily El Pais.
Majority of expulsions in Iran area
The great majority of expulsions occurs at the border city of Irun, with a reported 59 percent increase in the first nine months of the year over 2017, or up to 5,609, according to the sources. The resumption of border checks with ''non-admissions'', as they are defined technically, is justified by French authorities with the waiver of the Schengen accord for ''national security'' reasons and to fight terrorism after jihadist attacks in November 2015 in Paris. This is based on a bilateral accord in 2002, which allows France to immediately expel to Spain irregular migrants within four hours after they cross the border.
Various NGOs, including SOS Racisme, have denounced the high number of cases in which French gendarmerie officers, eluding the legal system, bring irregular migrants back to Spain aboard unmarked vans, leaving them on the other side of the border, as documented by footage broadcast in October by Basque television ETB.
The images have forced the Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska to acknowledge the practice while defending the operations as correct. The NGO hosting and assisting migrants in Irun has repeatedly denounced the emergency experienced by structures of transit for Irun and San Sebastian, in Guipuzcoa, which are overcrowded with volunteers struggling with mass arrivals.
NGO sources were quoted as saying by the TV Cuatro that ''more people arrive every day in addition to migrants sent back at the border, in many cases asylum seekers, without even a return order for Spanish police''.
Risk of collapse in Basque Country
France's rejection policy is putting social assistance services in Basque Country at risk of collapse with the Red Cross assisting nearly 10,000 migrants over the last few months.
The Spanish government, in defending the ''excellent relations'' with the neighboring country, which also cooperated with Madrid in dividing the migrants rescued by the Aquarius vessels and other NGOs in the Mediterranean, is keeping the controversy in check. It has not officially protested with French authorities, as confirmed by foreign ministry sources to El Pais. However, as already occurred with Italy, the expulsions risk sparking strong tensions.