The European Commission announced on Wednesday that it will provide Spain with €114.7 million to address the consequences of the mass arrivals recorded in Ceuta on July 30 and 31.
The funds will be used to strengthen border surveillance, establish facilities for registering and screening people still in the city, improve reception capacity, and expedite the processing of asylum applications and legal return procedures.
“Our priority remains clear. Those who have no right to stay must leave,” said Magnus Brunner, European Commissioner for Internal Affairs and Migration. Commission Executive Vice-President Henna Virkkunen, for her part, stated that Brussels stood “alongside Spain” in a situation that has placed one of the European Union’s external borders under considerable pressure.
Financial and operational support
The European package aligns almost perfectly with the two requests submitted by the Spanish government to Brussels. Madrid had requested €82.7 million from the “Asylum, Migration and Integration” Fund, along with just over €32 million from the European instrument dedicated to border management and visa policy.
This financial assistance is accompanied by operational support. Spain’s Interior Ministry requested the deployment of 10 additional Frontex officers to accelerate migrant identification, the extension of Operation Minerva, and support from the European Union Agency for Asylum in conducting interviews and providing interpreters.
Spain also requested that Frontex’s satellite surveillance be maintained, that the deployment of the Civil Guard vessel Duque de Ahumada in Spanish waters be extended into 2027, and that cooperation with Europol be strengthened to combat migrant-smuggling networks. Frontex, Europol, and the European Union Agency for Asylum responded positively and will increase their presence alongside Spanish authorities on the ground.
However, this return policy did not originate with the European announcement. On July 30, Spain and Morocco had already agreed to organize the return of all irregularly entered individuals “as soon as possible,” an undertaking confirmed at the time by official Moroccan sources.
On August 6, 12 days before the European Commission made its own announcement, Morocco also stated, in line with the High Royal Instructions, that it was ready to identify unaccompanied minors and work with Spain and its European partners to facilitate their return. Brussels has therefore only endorsed an approach that Rabat had already accepted and helped set in motion.
Europe urged to provide greater support to Morocco
Brussels’ announcement comes as Félix Sanz Roldán, former director of Spain’s National Intelligence Centre, called on Wednesday for greater European support. In remarks reported by EFE, he urged Pedro Sánchez’s government to promote within the European Union a mechanism to increase funding for Morocco to manage migration flows from the rest of Africa, following the model established with Turkey.
Félix Sanz Roldán highlighted a reality often absent from the Spanish debate. “Morocco’s migration problem is greater than Spain’s,” he said. The Kingdom continues to receive irregular arrivals along its southern border, and many of these migrants then spend two or three months in Morocco before attempting to reach Europe.
For the former head of Spain’s intelligence service, only a response based on “dialogue and cooperation” will prevent the events of late July from recurring.
The €114.7 million in aid granted to Spain therefore addresses the immediate emergency without resolving the underlying issue. If the European Union intends to act upstream, before migration flows reach its external border, it will also need to strengthen Morocco’s resources, as the main transit country and a frontline actor on the Western Mediterranean migration route.
