The Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, attributed this Friday to "plural causes" the massive arrival of 72,000 people in Ceuta, relieving Morocco of responsibility for a crisis that, he emphasized, "nobody" anticipated. Likewise, he avoided pointing to the CNI, the CIFAS, or the information services of the National Police, the Civil Guard, and the external service of the European Union.
"The state information services always function, I have never held any information service responsible, whether CNI, CIFAS, National Police, or Civil Guard," Marlaska defended during his rebuttal in the Interior Commission of the Congress of Deputies, in response to criticisms from various groups that pointed to Morocco and demanded clarifications about the warnings from the CNI.
"Of course there was concern, but as there was last year," he continued, detailing that among those "plural causes" are included "rumors on social media, improper use of the interpretation of a ruling --from the Supreme Court-- or misinformation about the state and security of the border," also reminding that an investigation into what happened is still open.
Recognition of Morocco's "containment"
Marlaska has once again highlighted the "containment" task that Morocco has been performing for years, also during the past month of July. Following the allusions from various spokespeople to the apology request from the Minister of Defense, Margarita Robles, the Interior Minister emphasized that he is also willing to acknowledge failures.
"I admit all the mistakes I may have, I am not here to justify myself, I present the facts," he stated, insisting immediately afterward that nobody anticipated the magnitude of the crisis in Ceuta. "That someone saw or said something about the 30, that is not true," he reiterated, in relation to the warnings received by the Interior, which he equated to those from previous years about attempts to swim into the autonomous city.
In line with what other ministers have expressed, Marlaska maintained that, had they had concrete data about a massive entry, different measures would have been adopted. "Do you want to tell me that it would not have been reasonably raised in a way that we can all understand? Are you telling me that? Is this serious?" he posed, evoking the precedent of the Ceuta crisis of 2021.
Previous warnings and data on interceptions
"What was discussed in those reports, as in other years, was immigration, economic difference as catalyzing factors of irregular immigration or the action of networks," explained Marlaska, also admitting that there were warnings related to the Supreme Court ruling that prevented returns by sea, which led the Ministry to start applying preventive measures.
"But there was also talk of the fundamental work of containment by Morocco," added the minister, who provided figures such as that, until the crisis of July 30, Moroccan authorities had stopped 1,026 attempts to swim into Ceuta and carried out 2,857 interceptions. He specified that these are lower figures than those of 2024, a year in which more than a thousand people were recorded attempting to swim in on a single day.
"The interceptions by Morocco are much higher; wanting to infer that we go to 72,000 seems to me that cannot be done," he insisted, emphasizing that on July 30 more people accessed via the breakwater than by sea.
The minister also denied that the deputy operational directors and other general commanders or commissioners of citizen security or immigration had not traveled to Ceuta. In addition, he announced that an "extraordinary gratification" for the state security forces deployed in the autonomous city is already underway, a measure that he recalled is not unprecedented, as it was already applied in other emergencies such as the Valencia flood of 2024.