Morocco maintains before the UN that “it has no land borders” with Spain and that Melilla is an “occupied prison”

The Alaouite kingdom defends the actions of its forces in the massive jump in Melilla in June “Morocco does not have land borders with Spain.” This is how resounding the Moroccan Government expresses itself in a letter sent to the UN Human Rights Council in response to the clarifications that had been requested for the “excessive and lethal use of force” against migrants of African origin in the events in the border fence of Melilla on June 24. In its letter, to which Europa Press has had access, the Moroccan Government is committed to making the circumstances clear from the beginning, before defending itself against the statements made in response to the letter that Several UN rapporteurs had sent in July requesting more information about the events of June. Thus, they clarify “once again” that it is “inaccurate” to refer to “the line of separation between Morocco and Melilla” as the “Spanish-Moroccan border”, as stated in their text, since “the Kingdom of Morocco does not have land borders with Spain and Melilla continues to be an occupied prison and for this reason, one cannot speak of borders, but of simple points s of passage”. From the meeting of Sánchez with the Alaouí monarch on April 7, a joint declaration was issued in which, among other things, it was announced “the full normalization of the movement of people and goods” would be restored “in an orderly manner , including the appropriate customs and people control devices at land and sea level”. This would translate, according to the President of the Government himself from Rabat, into the reopening of the Melilla customs office, closed by Morocco unilaterally in 2018, and the opening of a new one in Ceuta, where it did not exist to date. The Moroccan government did not confirm this point at any time, nor did it deny the Spanish Executive and in fact the statements of a high-ranking Alaouite questioning the geographical viability of customs were subsequently reduced. Morocco defends its action in the “border pressure” On the other hand , in the letter sent to the UN Human Rights Council -of which Morocco will be a member as of January 1- Morocco denounces the “unprecedented” migratory pressure to which it is subjected and accuses Algeria of “laxism” by allowing the passage through its border of thousands of immigrants bound for Moroccan territory. Regarding the events of June 24, he denounces the dissemination of “false information” regarding what happened, maintains that the immigrants were organized and in many cases had military training, and denounces the “unusual violence” with which they acted. which refers to the actions of the Moroccan security forces, stresses that the troops “were exclusively equipped with law enforcement equipment without any lethal firearms and no shots were fired” and they acted “in absolute respect of the principle of necessity and proportionality in the use of force”. Likewise, Morocco emphasizes that the deceased were 23 and not the 37 that is included in the letter sent by the UN rapporteurs, and that it was the figure offered by a Human Rights organization Human local, and assures that the autopsies carried out on all of them confirm that they died of suffocation in the avalanche and not by firearm. Having said all this, the Moroccan Government refutes the accusation sation of “structural racism and discriminatory treatment of individuals of African descent” – the main object of the letter from the UN rapporteurs – since the country has carried out “vast operations to regularize immigrants in an irregular situation” . Finally, it makes it clear that “Morocco has no responsibility for the return of immigrants in hot weather” but that “it is the responsibility of the Spanish authorities”. “Morocco is only suffering the consequences of a phenomenon whose security management alone has already shown its limits,” he adds.