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Spain to begin relocating migrant children from overcrowded centres
Most regions in Spain will have to make room for hundreds of displaced minors
Back in March, the Spanish government announced that it would be moving thousands of unaccompanied migrant children from some of the country’s most overcrowded facilities and ‘redistributing’ them to safer, better equipped accommodations across Spain. Now, it’s been revealed that only undocumented minors from the Canary Islands, along with the autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla, will be rehoused.
When the plan was first floated, several regions claimed that their migrant reception centres are overcrowded, but under the new decree, only three will be allowed to declare a ‘state of emergency.’ The rest will have to upscale their facilities to accommodate new foreign children and adolescents.
On any given day, each Spanish autonomous community should have approximately 32 places available for every 100,000 inhabitants, but the reality is often very different. Take the Canary Islands, for example.
While it has a normal capacity for 718 migrant minors, it currently cares for 5,566. Or, to put it another way: it has more than 4,848 more unaccompanied children and adolescents than it should have, exceeding its capacity by 675%.
Under the new law, every region of Spain (with the exception of the three mentioned above, along with the Balearic Islands) will now have to make room for the displaced minors.
The government is remaining tight-lipped about the exact number of children that will be moved and where they will be moved to, but preliminary figures suggest that Andalucía, Madrid and the Valencian Community are some of the regions with the largest capacity.
In any case, the authorities are determined to begin moving the migrants sometime over the summer, regardless of whether the regional governments agree or not.
In other news: Solar flare hits Spain, potentially disrupting GPS and power
Image: Archive
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