Death toll in Spain's Ceuta rises to 67 as thousands return to Morocco

A Spanish soldier uses a megaphone to speak to migrants sitting on the pavement prior to escorting them back to Morocco, in Spain`s north Africa`s Ceuta enclave on Saturday. PIC/AFP

The death toll in Spain's Ceuta border crisis with Morocco has climbed to 67, the Spanish government said Saturday. They included some who drowned and some who were killed in a stampede to cross a breakwater barrier.

Spain announced it was installing a 500-metre-long containment barrier along the breakwater fence into the sea after between 50,000 and 60,000 migrants breached the tiny Spanish territory's frontier between Thursday and Friday.

A handful of exhausted migrants who swam to Ceuta's urban Tarajal beach Saturday morning were met by soldiers who escorted them back across the border. Spain's interior ministry says the majority of those who entered the Spanish territory in North Africa have already returned to Morocco.

After days of chaos and streets packed with people who had hoped for a better life in Spain, residents of Ceuta woke up Saturday to an uneasy calm.

Even so, security for residents of the autonomous city of 84,000 remained bruised.

"Life in this city has been disrupted as a result of the border incident," said Ceuta's President Juan Jesus Vivas.

"The return of people has begun satisfactorily, but the process must be completed," he said. "The city has not yet returned to normal."

In Morocco, at Tangier's main railway station, migrants back from Ceuta or who had hoped to reach the European Union slept on the ground, exhausted, as passersby watched from a distance.

"I tried to cross, but I failed. I stayed near the border with Ceuta for two days, but I couldn't find anything to eat," said Abdalah, an aspiring migrant who asked that his last name not be published out of fear of retaliation for trying to cross illegally.

On the road leading to the Moroccan town of Fnideq, which borders Ceuta, many migrants were seen walking toward the fence, some barefoot, apparently hoping to try their luck.

Taxi drivers and bus operators were refusing to take them, fearing retaliation from authorities.

Police officers were deployed along the road, stopping and checking every vehicle heading toward Fnideq.

But some who had made it to Ceuta were determined to stay. Among them was Mohamed Hatri, a 23-year-old Moroccan.

"They've closed everything down so that we can't buy anything to eat, to force us to return to our country," he said.

"But even if they close it down... we're going to stay here, whether we're hungry or not."

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