Those who died trying to find a new life in Alicante

“The greatest vulnerability (…) occurs on the Balearic Islands route, where necessary tools, including air, are rarely activated to address alerts in the area,” the NGO’s report on the Algerian route states. Tuesday in Palma.

“The Algerian route is the second deadliest route in Spain (after the Canary Islands), but the most invisible,” Helena Maleno, spokeswoman for Caminando Fronteras, said at a news conference.

In the last five years, At least 1,562 people were killed or disappeared while trying to reach the coasts of Almería, Murcia, Alicante, Pitiusas and Mallorca. Those who came to Menorca were very small.

According to the information gathered from official institutions, social organizations and witnesses from Spain and Algeria for the preparation of the report, the departure ports of the Balearic Islands are located in the eastern half of the Algerian coast: Tipaza, Algeria, Dellys, Bugía and Jijel. The routes to the Spanish Levant are shorter: from Aïn Témouchent and Orán to Almería; from Mostaganem to the Murcian coast; And From Chlef, Cherchell and Tipaza to Alicante.

“People are taking greater risks (…), so the Balearic route has increased,” Maleno said of the roughly 350 kilometers from Algeria to the archipelago.

According to information from Caminando Fronteras, the number of migrants apprehended on the islands from 2019 to 2022 increased by 420% to 2,637 people last year, emphasizing that the main profile of these migrants is Algerian men younger than 30 years old. The 10-year-old is trying to escape her situations of poverty and lack of expectation, using Spain as a stopover to other European countries.

However, the number Immigrants from Syria, Yemen, Palestine, Morocco, Guinea, Mali, Burkina Faso and Cameroonand the presence of women on boats has also increased, many of them victims of violence and therefore more likely to seek protection or asylum, this is also the case with some men.

Maleno denounced the “stigma of the route” as information spread that identified immigrants from Algeria with the crime and human trafficking mafia. “This is not true,” the activist said, adding that the “patera taxi” cases are very specific and specific to short routes, most of the trips are organized by young people on small boats without security measures. .

On behalf of the Spanish institutions, “Marine Rescue protocols on this route are unclear and rather arbitrary”Indicates the report that provides greater emphasis on deficiencies in the Balearic Islands.

Pointing out that there are no search aircraft in the Balearic Islands, Maleno said, “Passive searches have been preferred on all routes of the state in recent years.” A shipwreck case “with the Americans” is made when receiving a report that a small boat en route to the islands has been lost.

Since 2021, twelve boats have been reported missing, along with migrants traveling from Algeria to the Balearic Islands.

According to the spokesperson of Caminando Fronteras, in this context, while the unidentified corpses of the immigrants who lost their lives at sea are piling up in morgues and cemeteries on the islands, the families of the disappeared are organizing in Algeria and even going to Mallorca for treatment and getting information about the whereabouts of the missing person. , but can’t find the answer.

Given this situation, many families being a victim of scammers in both Algeria and SpainAsking them for money for their search work and even deceiving them with lies, as their disappearance was in secret Spanish prisons.

Maleno requested a link between the data collected by the forensics and the Spanish judicial administration regarding the bodies found at sea with the information provided by the families of the disappeared.

This is one of the demands that Caminando Fronteras raised in separate meetings with Government delegate Aina Calvo and Head of Government Francina Armengol.