Moroccan-Spanish jointly patrol southern Spanish coasts
Morocco-Spain, Politics, 3/9/2005

A Moroccan-Spanish joint patrols started on Monday monitoring the Spanish southern coasts off the city of Almeria after the 1st stage of this operation was conducted from Feb.7 through 13 on the Moroccan Mediterranean coasts.

Deputy delegate of the Spanish government in Madrid announced on Tuesday Miguel Corpas that three members of the Spanish Guardia Civil and three Moroccan security agents are conducting monthly week-long surveillance missions alternately on Moroccan and Spanish sides.

Morocco and Spain started in July 2004 the anti-illegal migration joint operations between Morocco's southern shores and Spain's Canary Islands. The joint patrols were later on extended to the Mediterranean.

The Spanish official expected this form of cooperation to yield "very positive effects" on the short run in the fight against illegal migration, human trafficking webs, sea control of fishing activities and even on drug trafficking. Official figures show a dramatic drop of 18% in 2004 in the number of illegal immigrants reaching Spain on makeshift boats, compared to 2003.

Authorities arrested 15,675 people on their arrival at the Spanish territory across the Gibraltar strait and at the Canary islands and intercepted 740 "pateras" (dinghies), compared to 942 in 2003.

The number of corpses (80) retrieved dropped by 20% and 339 people were rescued (a drop of 17 pc), while the number of those unaccounted for (60) is half that of 2003.

Previous Stories:
  Morocco, Spain hail 'excellent' cooperation in fight against terrorism, illegal migration   (2/18/2005)
  Closer Moroccan-Spanish cooperation helped curb illegal migration, Spanish official   (2/17/2005)
  Madrid wants to support its policy change in North Africa with tangible   (2/3/2005)

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