The Canary Islands have experienced their highest number of recorded migrant arrivals in a single seven-day period. With more than 40 boats detected and almost 3,000 individuals landing illegally, previous weekly records were shattered. Police sources predict that this new figure “will soon be pulverised” if current trends continue to afflict the archipelago.
Critics of Spain’s ruling socialist (PSOE) and Christian-democratic Paɾtio Populaɾ (PP) parties say that failure to deal with migrants robustly is exercising a ‘pull factor’ bringing more to the Islands. Specifically, the official approach to unaccompanied minors is actually incentivising more young men to take the risky journey.
New figures from the State Security Forces and Corps compiled by La Gaceta show 2,823 illegal entries from the 16th to 22nd September. This exceeds the 2,759 immigrants detected during the recognised ‘worst week’ at the end of January 2024. It follows a Civil Guard report warning that the problem “remains at extreme levels,” while correctly predicting that it would almost certainly get worse in the second half of August. (The authorities began consolidating migration statistics in 2019.)
A majority of the boats arriving on the island of Lanzarote, 22 in total bringing in more than 1000 migrants, can be traced back to the Moroccan coasts of Tan-Tan and Agadir. Departures from Morocco feature most strongly in the weekly data, according to internal statistics from the General Immigration and Borders Commission (CGEF). The island of Fuerteventura logged more than 200 illegal arrivals, also from Morocco.
Authorities are also surprised by the growing significance of Mauritania as a point of departure. While Pedro Sánchez visited the West African state in search of agreement on migration, it seems to have had little effect on numbers. Ten canoes from the Mauritanian coast added to the problems of El Hierro (pop. 11,659), one of the islands—after Lanzarote—registering the most illegal immigration to date, putting even more pressure on the local infrastructure.
