From Africa to the North Sea…
Melilla, Sunday,
Everyone knows about Trump's wall between the United States and Mexico designed to keep out the hordes of migrants.
The price tag for President Trump's border wall topped $11 billion - or nearly $20 million a mile - to become the most expensive wall of its kind anywhere in the world. It may well have brought Trump's presidency to an early end. But not so many people know that the European Union too has increasingly resorted to walls and fences to keep out waves of migrants and refugees alike.
But then, in May this year, up to 10,000 people surged across the European Union's only land border with Africa - yes there is one! Moroccan border into Spain's Ceuta exclave - and even now, many hundreds are still here, mostly children, posing a quandary for the tiny territory.
Some distance away lies another Spanish town on the African continent. Melilla, fell as a Berber town to Spain in 1497 and remained Spanish despite a long history of sieges and was the town that precipitated the Spanish civil war. Today, a double fence lined with razor wire surrounds the exclave to keep immigrants, mainly African refugees, from entering. Nonetheless, 200 migrants climbed Melilla's imposing fence to enter Spain.
But then, in May this year, up to 10,000 people surged across the European Union's only land border with Africa - yes there is one! Moroccan border into Spain's Ceuta exclave - and even now, many hundreds are still here, mostly children, posing a quandary for the tiny territory.
Some distance away lies another Spanish town on the African continent. Melilla, fell as a Berber town to Spain in 1497 and remained Spanish despite a long history of sieges and was the town that precipitated the Spanish civil war. Today, a double fence lined with razor wire surrounds the exclave to keep immigrants, mainly African refugees, from entering. Nonetheless, 200 migrants climbed Melilla's imposing fence to enter Spain.
In reaction to all this, Santiago Abascal. the leader of the Spanish far-right Vox party wants to build an even larger wall to stop immigrants - and he wants Morocco to pay for it. Echoing Trump, Abascal even argues that as Morocco "sends waves of immigrants across the border" it should pay for the wall.
On the EU's Eastern flank, Hungary's prime minister has asked the European Union to pay half the cost of anti-migrant fences it built on its southern borders - €440 million.
Hungary originally made it a point of pride that it had paid for nearly all the costs of the fences and promoted a "Let's Stop Brussels" billboard campaign rejecting the EU's migration policies.
Meanwhile, at the other end of the European landmass, an international frontier called the Calais border barrier is under construction jointly by France and the United Kingdom. It aims, to prevent migrants from entering Britain by stowing away on trucks and ferries. A wall will cut the large migrant encampment known as the Calais Jungle off from access to the port and tunnel.
In terms of today's geopolitics, walls are much in vogue and there are now at least 60 around the world. Israel's wall on the West Bank ranks as the second most expensive - at between $1 million to $5 million a mile. It seems that it's not just Trump who believes that high walls make for good neighbors.
The 80-meter hard border
The shortest international border in the world is the one that separates mainland Morocco from Spanish 'Peñón de Vélez de la Gomera' which is made of two small rocks inhabited only by the Spanish military. The rocks are only connected to the continent by a beach that nobody is allowed to cross.
Tags:
Running Story…