Children in a strange land: the plight of the 1,000 minor migrants still in Spain's Ceuta

CEUTA, Spain (AP) — The dead have been recovered from the waters off Ceuta. Most of the migrants who forced their way across the frontier into Spain have gone back to Morocco. In the enclave city, shops are open nearly…

In the enclave city, shops are open nearly a week after it became the epicenter of a European migration crisis. But an estimated 1,000 minors — among the most vulnerable of those who crossed the border — remain in Ceuta, staying without their families in a foreign land. One 17-year-old girl told The Associated Press how she watched her 8-year-old brother drown as migrants made a chaotic crossing around a breakwater and a subsequent stampede on the rocky shore to avoid the border fence last Thursday at the peak of the migration surge.

She was separated from her mother and has been begging on the streets of Ceuta since. The AP is withholding her identity because she is a minor in a vulnerable situation. “I saw people stepping on the dead,” she said through a translator since she doesn’t speak Spanish.

“Now we are children begging on the street.” Spain’s Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska on Tuesday gave a fresh estimate of the migrants who pushed into Ceuta last week, saying a total of around 72,000 crossed over. Of those, he said, 70,000 had returned. Local official Alejandro Ramírez, however, said that it was impossible to know the exact number, which he estimated to be closer to 3,000-5,000 remaining in the city.

The Spanish minister also increased the death toll to 75 people who perished mostly in the water, during the crossing. Morocco reported 11 deaths which are not included in the Spanish total, the Spanish interior ministry said. Spanish authorities said many of the migrants went back voluntarily after they saw that there was little chance to reach mainland Europe, or that the tiny enclave of 84,000 people was unable or unwilling to accommodate them.

Spanish security forces have rounded up others, placing them on trucks and taking them back to the border, but by law, they’re not supposed to do that with unaccompanied minors. Like many migrants, the teenage girl from Tangier came to Ceuta, perched on the north African coast, driven by a viral social media onslaught to try a mad dash to Spain seeking better opportunities. She said some locals gave her food and some clothing, with one woman taking her into her home so she could bathe.