34 clandestine immigrants seized in Morocco: official

Tue May 6, 3:14 PM ET

RABAT (AFP) - Police in Morocco Tuesday arrested 34 Africans as they boarded an inflatable dinghy to try to cross the Mediterranean secretly to Europe, local officials said.

The migrants from various sub-Saharan African countries were held "just as they were about to take to sea aboard an inflatable dinghy headed for the Spanish coast," the Moroccan press agency Map quoted officials as saying.

They were caught near the Mediterranean port of Nador, the report said.

On Monday another 23 people, apparently would-be clandestine immigrants from Africa to Europe, were held during police raids in a suburb of Nador.

Meanwhile it was reported from Tunis that the local coastguard had arrested 12 Tunisians as they were about to board stolen boats for clandestine crossings to Italy.

The Tunisian newspaper Essabah said six were held on a deserted beach as they tested the engine of their vessel.

The others were stopped at sea aboard a fishing boat.

The 12 were held pending a court appearance in Tunisia on charges of trying to cross frontiers illegally, said the report.

Would-be immigrants and the risks they run in open boats across the Mediterranean are a perennial headache for Spain, Italy and the North African countries from which they depart in thousands every year.

Last Thursday over 300 African immigrants packed into three vessels, two of which got into trouble at sea, landed on the Italian island of Lampedusa, taking to over 1,000 the number of clandestine migrants who have landed on the Mediterranean island over recent days.

Almost all the occupants were from Eritrea, Ghana, Nigeria and Somalia.

The independent press in Tunisia, one of the North African countries of departure for immigrants, frequently reports the discovery of clandestine emigrants and of drownings.

The weekly Assabah-Ousbouii on Monday reported the discovery of four bodies off the Tunisian port of Mahdia after a boatload of immigrants sank last month.

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, recently returned to power, has vowed to crack down on clandestine immigrants.

But last month the human rights watchdog Amnesty International condemned European Union policies on asylum-seekers as a lottery for the right to stay in "Fortress Europe".

"Fortress Europe... is a reality," said secretary general Irene Khan.

"Access to Europe is very difficult and the initial border of the European Union is being pushed further and further away," she added, citing rescue operations in the Mediterranean, patrols in Senegal and increasing cooperation with transit countries.

On top of the overall difficulties facing would-be immigrants, Khan called European immigration policy "a lottery" due to the various policies in place throughout the EU.