MADRID: More than 150 migrants forced their way into Spain’s overseas territory of Ceuta on Friday, hours after 540 people alighted in Greece as pressure on southern European states continues despite an overall drop in arrivals.
The mass arrivals come after several charity ships that rescued migrants off the coast of Libya were denied access to Italian ports by outgoing hard-line interior minister Matteo Salvini.
On Friday, another such vessel belonging to charity Mediterranea Saving Humans warned of an impending health emergency on board as it was stuck at sea after being banned from entering Italian waters.
According to the latest data from the International Organization for Migration (IOM), more than 46,500 people had crossed the Mediterranean to Europe this year to August 28 and another 909 died in the attempt.
This marks a drop from the same period last year when over 68,000 people crossed and 1,562 died.
But southern European nations still bear the brunt of these arrivals.
On Thursday, Spain’s acting deputy prime minister Carmen Calvo said Europe should step in more.
“The countries that don’t have maritime borders also need to assume shared responsibility,” she told lawmakers.
In Spain’s north African enclave of Ceuta early on Friday, taking advantage of misty weather, 155 migrants stormed the barbed wire border that separates it from Morocco. Some of them clambered over while others broke through a door in the fence.
“They are all from sub-Saharan Africa, the majority from Guinea,” a spokesman for the central government’s office in Ceuta told AFP.
Ceuta and Melilla, another Spanish enclave, represent the European Union’s only lander borders with Africa.
All in all, though, the number of migrants arriving in both cities this year has dropped to just over 18 percent to 3,427 compared with 2018, according to the latest interior ministry figures.
This is the first time in a year that migrants have managed to storm the barbed wire fence in Ceuta as a group, the spokesman said.
Once on Spanish territory, they are usually taken to a migrant reception center where they can ask for asylum.
But Madrid has been known to send migrants back to Morocco.
In August last year, Spain sent back 116 migrants who had forced their way into Ceuta in a mass expulsion condemned by human rights activists.
It is as yet unclear what will happen in this case.
In Greece, meanwhile, around 540 migrants arrived Thursday evening on the island of Lesbos on board 13 boats from nearby Turkey, including 240 children.
They were transferred to the cramped Moria migrant camp where there are “nearly 11,000 people for a capacity of just 3,000,” medical charity Doctors without Borders (MSF) said.
A Greek diplomatic source, who refused to be named, said Athens had informed the European Union about this “unprecedented rise” in the number of migrants.
Greece has overtaken Spain this year to become the main entry point for migrants seeking to get to Europe.
At least 23,200 people have arrived by sea so far this year, according to the IOM.
Over near Italy, Mediterranea Saving Humans said it had 34 migrants on board its ship after 64 vulnerable people it had rescued, including women and children, were disembarked on Thursday.
It said it had sent a “new urgent request” for a safe port after being refused access to Italian waters.
This comes at a period of political limbo in Italy, as the premier designate rushes to form a new left-leaning coalition which could alter Salvini’s hard-line stance on immigrants.
Earlier this month, Spanish NGO Proactiva Open Arms faced a similar predicament when Italy refused its ship permission to dock.
The dozens of migrants on board remained stuck at sea for days until an Italian prosecutor ordered they disembark on the island of Lampedusa.
Spain agreed to take in 15 of those migrants as part of a deal with France, Germany, Portugal and Luxembourg to share out the new arrivals.
Mass arrivals of migrants into Spain’s Ceuta, Greece’s Lesbos island
Mass arrivals of migrants into Spain’s Ceuta, Greece’s Lesbos island
- In Spain’s north African enclave of Ceuta early on Friday, taking advantage of misty weather, 155 migrants stormed the barbed wire border that separates it from Morocco
- In Greece, meanwhile, around 540 migrants arrived Thursday evening on the island of Lesbos on board 13 boats from nearby Turkey, including 240 children
Pakistan locks down capital ahead of a planned rally by Imran Khan supporters
- Interior Ministry is considering a suspension of mobile phone services in parts of Pakistan in the coming days
- Pakistan has banned gatherings of five or more people in Islamabad for two months to deter Khan’s supporters
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan is sealing off its capital, Islamabad, ahead of a planned rally by supporters of imprisoned former premier Imran Khan.
It’s the second time in as many months that authorities have imposed such measures to thwart tens of thousands of people from gathering in the city to demand Khan’s release.
The latest lockdown coincides with the visit of Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, who arrives in Islamabad on Monday.
Local media reported that the Interior Ministry is considering a suspension of mobile phone services in parts of Pakistan in the coming days. On Friday, the National Highways and Motorway Police announced that key routes would close for maintenance.
It advised people to avoid unnecessary travel and said the decision was taken following intelligence reports that “angry protesters” are planning to create a law and order situation and damage public and private property on Sunday, the day of the planned rally.
“There are reports that protesters are coming with sticks and slingshots,” the statement added.
Multicolored shipping containers, a familiar sight to people living and working in Islamabad, reappeared on key roads Saturday to throttle traffic.
Pakistan has already banned gatherings of five or more people in Islamabad for two months to deter Khan’s supporters and activists from his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, or PTI.
Khan has been in prison for more than a year in connection and has over 150 criminal cases against him. But he remains popular and the PTI says the cases are politically motivated.
A three-day shutdown was imposed in Islamabad for a security summit last month.
Indian man awakes on funeral pyre
- Doctors sent Rohitash Kumar, 25, to mortuary instead of conducting postmortem after he fell ill
- Kumar was rushed to hospital on Friday for treatment but was confirmed dead later
JAIPUR: An Indian man awoke on a funeral pyre moments before it was to be set on fire after a doctor skipped a postmortem, medical officials said Saturday.
Rohitash Kumar, 25, who had speaking and hearing difficulties, had fallen sick and was taken to a hospital in Jhunjhunu in the western state of Rajasthan on Thursday.
Indian media reported he had had an epileptic seizure, and a doctor declared him dead on arrival at the hospital.
But instead of the required postmortem to ascertain the cause of death, doctors sent him to the mortuary, and then to be burned according to Hindu rites.
D. Singh, chief medical officer of the hospital, told AFP that a doctor had “prepared the postmortem report without actually doing the postmortem, and the body was then sent for cremation.”
Singh said that “shortly before the pyre was to be lit, Rohitash’s body started movements,” adding that “he was alive and was breathing.”
Kumar was rushed to hospital for a second time, but was confirmed dead on Friday during treatment.
Authorities have suspended the services of three doctors and the police have launched an investigation.
NATO chief discusses ‘global security’ with Trump
- NATO allies say keeping Kyiv in the fight against Moscow is key to both European and American security
Brussels: NATO chief Mark Rutte held talks with US President-elect Donald Trump in Florida on the “global security issues facing the alliance,” a spokeswoman said Saturday.
The meeting took place on Friday in Palm Beach, NATO’s Farah Dakhlallah said in a statement.
In his first term Trump aggressively pushed Europe to step up defense spending and questioned the fairness of the NATO transatlantic alliance.
The former Dutch prime minister had said he wanted to meet Trump two days after Trump was elected on November 5, and discuss the threat of increasingly warming ties between North Korea and Russia.
Trump’s thumping victory to return to the US presidency has set nerves jangling in Europe that he could pull the plug on vital Washington military aid for Ukraine.
NATO allies say keeping Kyiv in the fight against Moscow is key to both European and American security.
“What we see more and more is that North Korea, Iran, China and of course Russia are working together, working together against Ukraine,” Rutte said recently at a European leaders’ meeting in Budapest.
“At the same time, Russia has to pay for this, and one of the things they are doing is delivering technology to North Korea,” which he warned was threatening to the “mainland of the US (and) continental Europe.”
“I look forward to sitting down with Donald Trump to discuss how we can face these threats collectively,” Rutte said.
Indian man awakes on funeral pyre
JAIPUR, India: An Indian man awoke on a funeral pyre moments before it was to be set on fire after a doctor skipped a postmortem, medical officials said Saturday.
Rohitash Kumar, 25, who had speaking and hearing difficulties, had fallen sick and was taken to a hospital in Jhunjhunu in the western state of Rajasthan on Thursday.
Indian media reported he had had an epileptic seizure, and a doctor declared him dead on arrival at the hospital.
But instead of the required postmortem to ascertain the cause of death, doctors sent him to the mortuary, and then to be burned according to Hindu rites.
D. Singh, chief medical officer of the hospital, told AFP that a doctor had “prepared the postmortem report without actually doing the postmortem, and the body was then sent for cremation.”
Singh said that “shortly before the pyre was to be lit, Rohitash’s body started movements,” adding that “he was alive and was breathing.”
Kumar was rushed to hospital for a second time, but was confirmed dead on Friday during treatment.
Authorities have suspended the services of three doctors and the police have launched an investigation.
Fighting between armed sectarian groups in restive northwestern Pakistan kills at least 33 people
- Senior police officer said Saturday armed men torched shops, houses and government property overnight
- Although the two groups generally live together peacefully, tensions remain, especially in Kurram
PESHAWAR: Fighting between armed Sunni and Shiite groups in northwestern Pakistan killed at least 33 people and injured 25 others, a senior police officer from the region said Saturday.
The overnight violence was the latest to rock Kurram, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, and comes days after a deadly gun ambush killed 42 people.
Shiite Muslims make up about 15 percent of the 240 million people in Sunni-majority Pakistan, which has a history of sectarian animosity between the communities.
Although the two groups generally live together peacefully, tensions remain, especially in Kurram.
The senior police officer said armed men in Bagan and Bacha Kot torched shops, houses and government property.
Intense gunfire was ongoing between the Alizai and Bagan tribes in the Lower Kurram area.
“Educational institutions in Kurram are closed due to the severe tension. Both sides are targeting each other with heavy and automatic weapons,” said the officer, who spoke anonymously because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
Videos shared with The Associated Press showed a market engulfed by fire and orange flames piercing the night sky. Gunfire can also be heard.
The location of Thursday’s attack was also targeted by armed men, who marched on the area.
Survivors of the gun ambush said assailants emerged from a vehicle and sprayed buses and cars with bullets. Nobody has claimed responsibility for the attack and police have not identified a motive.
Dozens of people from the district’s Sunni and Shiite communities have been killed since July, when a land dispute erupted in Kurram that later turned into general sectarian violence.
