Spain: Not enough refugees receiving asylum

Half of all immigrants who jump the fence in Ceuta and Melilla are refugees but only 10% of them manage to receive asylum.

According to a report by the Spanish Commission for Refugee Aid (CEAR) around half of the immigrants who jump the fences come from war-torn countries and should be given asylum in Spain although only around 10% of them receive it.

CEAR has presented a campaign to collect 100,000 signatures with which to ask the government to take away the concertinaed barbed wire from the top of the fence and to respect human rights.

CEAR explains that refugees “are people who never expected to have to leave their countries and ask for asylum in order to preserve their lives and physical safety.”

Carlos Berzosa, president of CEAR, has claims that the government is trying to make out that jumping the fence is a recent problem in order to justify its “repressive methods,” when in actual fact this has always happened at that border.

He goes on to say that only 5% of illegal immigrants come in through the fences in Ceuta and Melilla - the rest come in through airports, roads and trains.